Female Sport Role Models: A Content Analysis of ESPN.Com

Opportunities for girls to participate in sports are growing by the minute. However, adolescent girls are dropping out from participating in athletics with many possible explanations. One explanation is the limited and sometimes controversial media attention female athletes receive. How are girls to know there is a sporting world out there for them if they are unable to see positive female athletic role models to emulate? This study investigated ESPN.com to discover the trends of college basketball reporting during the 2007 NCAA Men's and Women's basketball tournaments. A content analysis was performed on ESPN .com to see if the media attention was equal for female athletes and coaches compared to male athletes and coaches. Results showed that equality does not exist on ESPN.com's main webpage; however, equality does exist when comparing the sport specific individual webpages.