Validity and reliability of a voice-recognition game analysis system for field sports

The purpose of this study was to assess the ability of observers to use voice-recognition analysis to accurately classify gait transitions and quantify gait durations typical of team games. Inter-rater and intra-rater reliability was also determined. Four males were filmed performing pre-determined gait protocols, each comprising different sequences of walking, jogging. running and sprinting. Two operators independently classified gait transitions and the time spent in each gait was determined by the voice recognition system. All gait modes as measured by trained observers demonstrated statistically significant correlations (p<O.O I) to predetermined measurement criteria. The mean absolute error for all gait transitions was less than half a second (0.32-0.36 5) with the maximum percentage error being approximately 4% for the walk, jog and run gaits and 10% for sprinting. Gait classification error was low at 1-9%. The intra-rater and inter-rater reliability was consistently high ranging from r =' 0.87 to 0.99. In conclusion, observers using voice-recognition software provided valid measures of time spent in each of the four gait categories with 90% or better accuracy achieved.

Bad sports : the risks associated with not 'fitting in'

This paper is about peer rejection and bullying in schools and the tragic consequences that it can have. The focus of the paper is in the ways schools interact with groups of young males and, more importantly, those who are left out of these groupings. My concern is that schools currently give too little attention to informing and/or shaping the peer group practices of young people. I argue that the current educational theory and practice focus too heavily on individuals and their potential to act independently and overlook the all-important socialization that takes place within and between groups. Drawing on two case-studies of young males who experience peer rejection, I seek to raise concerns about the contemporary socializing practices of young males and the burgeoning need for schools to play a role in bringing about change. Given the continued prominence of sport as a trajectory for defining the dominant masculinity, I believe that it is critical that physical educators engage with the discussions and debates that surround this topic.

Integrating highlights for more complete sports video summarization

Summarization is an essential requirement for achieving a more compact and interesting representation of sports video contents. We propose a framework that integrates highlights into play segments and reveal why we should still retain breaks. Experimental results show that fast detections of whistle sounds, crowd excitement, and text boxes can complement existing techniques for play-breaks and highlights localization.

An empirical analysis of gender differences in sports attendance motives

In Australia, male sports attendees outnumber female sports attendees by 25%, yet little research has been conducted into the attendance motives of women. This study undertakes an analysis of 460 respondents using descriptive and multivariate statistics to distinguish the attendance motivations of women and compare them directly to those of male attendees. The findings suggest that female attendance can be influenced through management and promotional strategies.

Exercise dependence and elite athletes: perceptions of coaches of elite athletes.

Exercise dependence (EXD) is a psychological condition associated with physical, emotional, social and performance consequences. Despite growing awareness of the prevalence of EXD within the athletic population, the symptoms or dimensions that comprise the condition largely remain unclear. The aim of the present study was to examine the perceptions of coaches relating to the symptoms or dimensions that define EXD among athletes. Participants were 90 coaches of elite athletes employed by the Australian Institute of Sport and State Institutes of Sport in Australia. Coaches completed an EXD checklist and a separate checklist of characteristics of committed exercisers. Both checklists contained 31 dimensions. The results supported a constellation of cognitive, emotional, behavioral, physical, social and performance dimensions. The results are discussed in terms of the consequences of EXD for elite athletes. Implications for coaches and teammates of elite athletes who experience EXD are also highlighted.

Sports-events, tourism and destination marketing strategies: an Australian case study of Athens 2004 and its media telecast

The focus of this study was the media telecast of the Athens 2004 Summer Olympic Games. The study explored the efficacy of the Australian telecast in developing positive perceptions and attitudes of Greece as a tourist  destination and was origin-based—in that a survey was undertaken of a sample of Australian residents (n = 350). Participants were segmented based on their post-consumption perceptions of Greece. Four segments were identified and labelled—'extremely positive' (n = 75), 'highly positive' (n = 153), 'positive' (n = 83) and 'negative' (n = 29). Statistical differences were found between the segments based on whether attitudes towards Greece had improved as a result of their consumption of the media telecast of the Athens 2004 Olympic Games (Athens 2004). To gain insights into this phenomenon, open-ended responses provided by segment members were then analysed.

Across the sample, 38.7% of respondents indicated that their overall attitude towards Greece as tourist destination changed as a result of their consumption of the telecast of Athens 2004. Considering that the attitudes of participants in the current study improved, not as a result of first-hand experiences at the destination, but as a result of their vicarious experiences of the destination through consumption of a media telecast of a special event, the results provide insights to the efficacy of this particular telecast in developing positive attitudes with regard to Greece as a tourist destination. The results of this study could be used a benchmark for future event-related destination marketing strategies. Similarities and differences emerged between the segments with regard to the reasons as to why members of each of the clusters attitudes towards Greece as a tourist destination had improved as a result of their consumption of the telecast. While their responses appeared to be similar, the frequency in which the concepts emerged for each of the segments varied intensity. The key issues that emerged for the four clusters were the appearance of Greece; culture and history of Greece; capacity, or 'hostability', of Greece to stage the Athens 2004; and infrastructure in Greece.

The profit-driven action sport industry working within the not-for-profit Australian sport system : the case of freestyle BMX Australia and the Australian sports commission

When not-for-profit organisations and for-profit organisations are forced to work together, conflict can arise. This paper explores the tensions that have resulted in the Australian sport setting when the Australian Sport Commission (ASC), with its emphasis predominantly directed at not for profit sport, sought to embrace the traditionally for profit sport of Freestyle BMX into the mainstream sport system. This case study traces the development and implementation of the ASC's Street Active program through Freestyle BMX. It was found that Freestyle BMX experienced mission drift and did not provide a product or service relevant to its consumers by adhering to the guidelines required by the ASC. Further, in the development of the program, the ASC did not expect the rivalry between suppliers in the free market action sport industry when it engaged three management groups to deliver the Street Active program. As a result the action sport industry is further fragmented into for-profit agencies, and farther removed from the Australia's federal governing agency, the ASC.

Content-based video indexing for sports applications using integrated multi-modal approach

To sustain an ongoing rapid growth of video information, there is an emerging demand for a sophisticated content-based video indexing system. However, current video indexing solutions are still immature and lack of any standard. This doctoral consists of a research work based on an integrated multi-modal approach for sports video indexing and retrieval. By combining specific features extractable from multiple audio-visual modalities, generic structure and specific events can be detected and classified. During browsing and retrieval, users will benefit from the integration of high-level semantic and some descriptive mid-level features such as whistle and close-up view of player(s).

Who speaks on footballers and sexual assault? A gender analysis of sports reporting

The recent spate of sexual assault allegations made against Australian Football League (AFL) players has generated intense media scrutiny and public concern. Following from similar highly publicised allegations directed at the National Rugby League, these incidents have engendered significant debates around sexism and football culture in the popular press. It is the media’s response to allegations of sexual assault made against AFL footballers that will be analysed here. This study offers a content analysis of articles from the sport sections of two major Australian newspapers, The Age and the Herald-Sun, with the aim of assessing the prevalence of women’s perspectives on the issue of player misconduct and whether the gender of the reporter has any bearing on gender stereotyping in sport reporting. By assessing how the phenomenon of player misconduct has been covered in sport news, this paper evaluates the media’s role in changing dominant attitudes and perceptions of gender relations in Australian society.

An analysis of factors relating to attendance at sports events

The factors that motivate attendance at sports events are many and varied and include social dimensions and on-site entertainment. Recent studies have found that attendance at sporting events in Australia is on the rise with approximately seven million Australians attending sporting events in 2002 (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2003). The Australian bureau of statistics reports, however, that in the five-year period to 2002, male spectators outnumbered female spectators by 25%. This paper reports on a survey of 460 respondents from the city and suburbs of Melbourne that identifies and explores the factors that motivate attendance at sports events and compares the responses of male and female respondents. The findings show that male and female attendees place a different emphasis on different attendance factors and that venue managers can influence attendance through a variety of management and promotional strategies.

An empirical analysis of attendance factors relating to the female sports market

Although approximately seven million Australians attended sporting events in 2002, male spectators outnumbered female spectators by 25 percent (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2003). This study investigates the reasons for this difference by analysing a survey of 175 female sporting event attendees. The findings show that female attendance motivations are different for different sporting events, for example, football, horse racing and tennis. A number of other factors that were also found to influence attendance amongst the female market are explained and discussed and implications for sports venue managers are presented.

Sports training, science and class among British amateur athletes in the mid to late nineteenth century

Organised amateur sports emerged in the second half of the nineteenth century. This paper, an exercise in historical sociology, analyses how a new system of sports training was devised by the amateurs to meet their particular needs. The data comes from contemporary British training manuals and the analysis is informed by the theories of Bourdieu and Foucault. That amateurs came from the higher social classes was highly
significant: it meant that they could not adopt existing training practices because these were associated with plebeian professional athletes. For amateurs to have followed the preparation of the professionals would have placed their bodies under the control of a social inferior and promoted a somatic shape more in keeping with the lower than with
the higher social orders. Mirroring the social distance between them, amateurs came to stridently reject professional training practices. Instead, they devised new training techniques which were justified through recourse to contemporary bio-medical knowledge. It is argued that amateur training originated for social reasons, with the proponents’ class positions and social capital facilitating the evocation of scientific knowledge as a legitimating ideology.

Isn't sport taxing? The taxation of sports professionals post-Agassi

In Agassi v Robinson (Her Majestyʹs Inspector of Taxes), a majority of the House of Lords found that payments under two sponsorship contracts between a company owned and controlled by Mr Andre Agassi, (Agassi Enterprises Inc) and Nike Inc and Head Sport AG were assessable under UK tax law. This was so despite (i) none of the parties to the contracts was resident, nor domiciled, in the United Kingdom and (ii) none of the payer companies conducted business, directly or indirectly, through branches/agencies in the United Kingdom. The article considers whether the Australian Taxation Office could similarly assess non‐resident sports‐persons, like Mr Agassi, personally, and/or entities they control, on payments made under sponsorship agreements with a company such as Nike Inc. While the preferable view is that such payments are not sourced in Australia, Australian source rules are so ill defined that there is some basis for asserting such payments are sourced in Australia.