Thirty Years and Counting: Do We Still Need the ICIS Women’s Breakfast?

This article discusses an important panel held at ICIS 2011 in Shanghai to mark over thirty years of an ICIS institution, the ICIS Women’s Breakfast. The panel addressed the controversial question—is there still a need for the ICIS Women’s Breakfast? Panelists were asked if the ICIS Women’s Breakfast could be seen as divisive, and if, women’s issues are different from issues of diversity such as race or sexual  orientation. They were also asked why they thought women were still  underrepresented in our academic community, and if the lack of women at senior levels was a concern for the community. Finally, the panelists were asked what practices the community would need to adopt to combat what could be seen as structural discrimination in our community, which we believe reflects the wider world we live in. We frame the debate and the ensuing discussion in the literature about women in academia, and conclude with some practical and constructive  recommendations for the community as a whole.

The Integrated Model of Sport Confidence: A Canonical Correlation and Mediational Analysis

The main purpose of the study was to examine crucial parts of Vealey’s (2001) integrated framework hypothesizing that sport confidence is a mediating variable between sources of sport confidence (including achievement, self-regulation, and social climate) and athletes’ affect in competition. The sample consisted of 386 athletes, who completed the Sources of Sport Confidence Questionnaire, Trait Sport Confidence Inventory, and Dispositional Flow Scale-2. Canonical correlation analysis revealed a confidence-achievement dimension underlying flow. Bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals in AMOS 20.0 were used in examining mediation effects between source domains and dispositional flow. Results showed that sport confidence partially mediated the relationship between achievement and  self-regulation domains and flow, whereas no significant mediation was found for social climate. On a subscale level, full mediation models emerged for achievement and flow dimensions of challenge–skills balance, clear goals, and concentration on the task at hand.

Editorial : Surveillance and sport

Sports represent an ideal field to explore the importance of everyday surveillance practices. The routines of preparation associated with conducting or participating in a sports mega event at international level highlight unique facets of surveillance as everyday and normalised elements of elite international or professional sports performance. While these routines do have potential individual or social costs, or are open to various forms of subversion by athletes willing to challenge the broader objectives of fair play, other forces, such as the media or formal governance reactions to a detected rule violation, provide fuel for more rigorous forms of surveillance. This spiral of surveillance permeates downwards to impact on prospective elite athletes, and outwards to impact on other forms of behaviour considered to compromise integrity or fair play. How these values mirror and intersect with norms of surveillance in everyday life is a fruitful site for on-going research and theorisation.

Surveillance, Governance and Professional Sport

The surveillance capacities of professional sports clubs and Leagues are directly related to their modes of governance. This paper identifies how private sports clubs enact surveillance through processes of inclusion and exclusion. Using three examples to demonstrate these processes, we argue that the surveillance mechanisms associated with sports governance at times replicate, at other times contradict, and at other times influence those associated with broader law enforcement and security developments. These examples also suggest potential increases in surveillance activities that emerge in club governance often flow from external concerns regarding allegations of crime, national security breaches and corruption. These context-specific case studies (Flyvbjerg 2001) demonstrate how surveillance and identity authentication are closely tied to the complex, multi-tiered governance structures and practices in three distinct sports. We then explore how these patterns can be interpreted as either connected to or distinct from equivalent developments involving the surveillance surge (Murakami Wood 2009) and concepts of inclusion and exclusion under the criminal law. We conclude by discussing how both internal and external regulatory forces can shape interrelated facets of surveillance, governance and exclusion in elite sports.

Alcohol consumption and sport: a cross-sectional study of alcohol management practices associated with at-risk alcohol consumption at community football clubs

Background
Excessive alcohol consumption is responsible for considerable harm from chronic disease and injury. Within most developed countries, members of sporting clubs participate in at-risk alcohol consumption at levels above that of communities generally. There has been limited research investigating the predictors of at-risk alcohol consumption in sporting settings, particularly at the non-elite level. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between the alcohol management practices and characteristics of community football clubs and at-risk alcohol consumption by club members.

Methods
A cross sectional survey of community football club management representatives and members was conducted. Logistic regression analysis (adjusting for clustering by club) was used to determine the association between the alcohol management practices (including alcohol management policy, alcohol-related sponsorship, availability of low- and non-alcoholic drinks, and alcohol-related promotions, awards and prizes) and characteristics (football code, size and location) of sporting clubs and at-risk alcohol consumption by club members.

Results
Members of clubs that served alcohol to intoxicated people [OR: 2.23 (95% CI: 1.26-3.93)], conducted ‘happy hour’ promotions [OR: 2.84 (95% CI: 1.84-4.38)] or provided alcohol-only awards and prizes [OR: 1.80 (95% CI: 1.16-2.80)] were at significantly greater odds of consuming alcohol at risky levels than members of clubs that did not have such alcohol management practices. At-risk alcohol consumption was also more likely among members of clubs with less than 150 players compared with larger clubs [OR:1.45 (95% CI: 1.02-2.05)] and amongst members of particular football codes.

Conclusions
The findings of this study suggest a need and opportunity for the implementation of alcohol harm reduction strategies targeting specific alcohol management practices at community football clubs.

Culture, media and sport : the Gambling Act 2005: a bet worth taking? Written evidence submitted by Professor Linda Hancock

At the outset, it should be noted that under the watch of the 2005 Gambling Act, there is robust evidence of increasing harms caused by gambling. The increase in problem gambling from 0.6% (prior to the implementation of the Act) to 0.9% of the British population reported in the British Gambling Prevalence Survey (BGPS) (2010) is significant at the .05 level; which is internationally recognised as a robust significance level. This represents a 50% rise in problem gambling since the Act was implemented. It was disingenuous of the Gambling Commission to report the results as “not statistically relevant” and “at the margins of statistical relevance” in its media release concerning the study. This equates to around 451,000 adults aged 16 and over experiencing serious gambling-related problems and significant additional numbers experiencing moderate problems. Regular (approximately monthly) use of gaming machines, fixed odds betting terminals (FOBTs) in betting shops, casino games and online gambling are associated with problem gambling.

Women’s sexual response to erotica: the effect of stimulus factors

This research investigated the effect of erotic stimulus content on women’s subjective sexual arousal. It was concluded that subtle changes in specific stimulus content did not affect women’s arousal. The research also found that women’s expectations predicted how aroused they would become. Absorption was also associated with women’s subjective arousal.

Brand love in sport: antecedents and consequences

This study explores brand love within the sport context. Specifically, this thesis addresses the scarcity of exploratory empirical investigations of brand love and provides an understanding of the dimensions of brand love and further establishes an empirical relationship between brand associations, brand love, and loyalty.

Factors influencing women’s choice of weight-loss diet

Women's motives for weight-loss dieting and choice of method were investigated in 151 current and 182 prospective dieters. Problematically, appearance-motivated dieters preferred ‘fad’ diets with the promise of quick results, and prospective dieters preferred marketing information supporting such diets over health advice cautioning against their use.