(Not) Higher, Stronger or Swifter: Representation of Female Olympic Athletes in the Israeli Press

Despite the IOC declaration of intent for gender equality in sport and in light of the fact that a greater number of women are participating in the Olympic Games covert connotations are hidden behind the distorted and biased image presented of female athletes in the press. The current study asks whether the size and extent of coverage really matter; does more extensive coverage necessarily mean equal and true representation of women in sport, or are we getting more of the same? The findings in this study indicate two parallel processes in terms of article content: First, the greater the number of articles, the more stereotypical and biased the content becomes. Secondly, over the years, representation of female athletes has become increasingly negative and biased. Over the three Olympic Games examined (1996, 2000, 2004), female athletes were presented in a biased and stereotypical ways in relative to male athletes. The change in coverage over the years has proven to be a tendency to stereotypically present female athletes in a more negative light in comparison to male athletes

Coexistence and sport: the Israeli case

Utilizing sports and other recreational activities to foster peaceful relations and coexistence is an idea that has gained popularity in recent years, particularly in Israel. The aim of the current research is to fill a gap in the research literature on the subject of coexistence programming. The Mifalot organization conducts a program called “Get to Know Your Neighbor” in which Palestinian, Jordanian, and Israeli youth play soccer together. The program, based mainly on the participants’ love for football, is a series of activities and lessons designed to prepare children to meet and interact with youth from neighboring communities. The study examines the effects of participation in this program on the attitudes of the Palestinians, Jordanians, and Israelis toward each other

Evidence for Cross-Cultural Support for the Underdog: Is the Affiliation Driven by Fairness and Competence Assessments?

Jesus told his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” (Matthew 19:23–24). Ditto for heroes. The current study suggests that “humble beginnings” is also a prerequisite for one to become an adulated entity. Participants from China, Israel, and Japan read of two sports teams with disparate expectations and/or financial resources about to face each other. Support was extended to the lesser one. When the two domains of comparison were contrasted, participants wished the lower resources/high expectations team to win the game. This finding was interpreted as an impetus to maintain basic fairness based on competency assessments, both fundamental and universal psychological needs, at the root of the choice to support underdogs. In conclusion, we explore how support underdog relates generally to the concept of heroism

Life Coaching In Israel: An Overview of Israel's Burgeoning LifeCoaching Industry

The aim of the study is to shed light on the process by which life-coaching has become a thriving industry in Israel. By performing an Internet search followed by website analysis, document analysis and in-depth interviews with key people in the industry, we suggest that there is a distorted notion of life-coaching, both from a professional and an ethical perspective. It appears that the Israeli life-coaching industry is too immature and fragmented to have yet developed a standard. The main findings, as well as the industry’s future directions and avenues for future research, are presented and discussed

Barriers to women’s access to decision-making positions in sport organizations: the case of establishing a girls’ volleyball academy in Israel

The aim of this paper is to highlight the nature of the barriers facing women in terms of their participation in decision-making in Israeli sport, and to identify and evaluate some of the strategies and tactics adopted to overcome these barriers. This is done by making reference to a particular case study, the case of the process of establishing a major policy initiative in Israeli sport – the founding of the national Volleyball Academy for Young Talented Girls. The case is analyzed in order to identify how and why the goal of establishing the Academy was successful, and to consider what may be learned in terms of the implications for the tactics and strategies used that might be adopted by other women in similar circumstances

The effects of the 2020–2021 Coronavirus pandemic change-event on football refereeing: evidence from the Israeli and Portuguese leagues

Upon the emergence of the 2020 Coronavirus pandemic (CP), football referees were forced to cope with the interruption of leagues and experience quarantines, with a potential threat to their physical and psychological well-being. This study examined referees’ perceptions of the CP change-event, particularly the effects on refereeing engagement and performance, in part to facilitate more effective support. For this study, an online inventory was circulated during January–February 2021 to 198 referees and assistants from Israel and Portugal, asking them to reflect on the CP in the context of their careers, and the potential effects on theirrefereeing engagement and performance. The results indicated that the CP was perceived as a moderate change-event in terms of significance, severity, and coping, although many participants didconsider it as significant. The participants indicated just a minor reduction in their refereeing quality between the 2019–2020 and the 2020–2021 seasons. The main areas affected were training on agrass field, decision-making training, and financial status. Still, refereeing instruction (conducted mainly online) improved. The behavioural effects were more forceful among the nonprofessional referees, suggesting that Referee Associations must pay closer attention to support these populations. The participants’ motivation, refereeing identity, and self-efficacy were actually improved. Finally, the absence of the crowd in matches allowed the referees to be more aware of their actions and better communicate with players and coaches, which related to better performance. These findings further emphasize the social aspect of football refereeing and the importance of having upright management and communication skills.The authors would like to thank the Israel Referee Union in the Israel Football Association, the Portuguese Referees Committee and Portugal Football School for supporting this studyinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The Americanization of Israeli basketball (1978-1996) - a figurational analysis

By adopting a developmental approach, this thesis studied the case of Israeli basketball and documented the process by which Israeli basketball, as part of Israeli culture, was Americanized.;Recognizing that Americanization needs to be viewed as part of broader globalization, processes, this study examined how far developments in Israeli basketball can be explained as aspects of an Americanization process.;Using Israeli professional basketball as the prism to identify the Americanization process occurring within Israeli society as a whole, this thesis illustrates how basketball in Israel became involved in the network of overlapping social and global forces. The thesis discusses the power relations and balances among various groups and people involved in the development of Israeli basketball such as Israeli, American and naturalized players, coaches, Israel Basketball Association leaders and administrators, sponsors and entrepreneurs, mayors, lawyers, parliament members, reporters, journalists and commentators. All these actors were implicated to a greater or lesser extent in influencing the developmental trajectory of Israeli basketball and were caught up in, and helped contribute to, the process of Americanization.;Going beyond the search for a single cause for the process of Americanization, this thesis also discusses the power relations among various groups that constitute Israel society, based on the analysis of processes such as 'professionalization', 'secularization', 'urbanization', and 'militarization', that gathered momentum parallel to the Americanization process.;In the case of Israeli basketball, and in a much broader context, the suggestion is that Israel society is being 'overshadowed', maybe more than ever before, by the more powerful American state. However, as this thesis indicates and as process-sociologists would argue, assimilation, at least in any simple sense, is not a sufficient explanation for the observed events

Choking or Delivering Under Pressure? The Case of Elimination Games in NBA Playoffs

Neoclassical economic theories foretell that individuals exert the most effort, and consequently produce their best performances, when the net returns to effort are highest. We scanned through 33 NBA seasons and analyzed 1930 playoffs games in order to test this prediction. Analysis of win probabilities in games where one of the two teams faces elimination from the playoffs, demonstrated that the threat of severe losses didn’t lead to elevated level of performance. While previous studies analyzed mainly single-level performance in a stable environment, our results shed light on collective performance in a dynamic setting. These findings can be applicable to other realms as we suggest that managers should refrain from deliberate building of high-pressure environments with hopes of achieving performance enhancement effect among their groups