Communication Studies senior Sara House impressed judges at the 9th annual Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) with her three-minute presentation: a comprehensive analysis of Sports Illustrated's March Madness tournament coverage looking specifically at their representation of men's and women's basketball. So much so, she took home one of the first place prizes for her work.
House's research examined Sports Illustrated articles from selection Sunday to the day after the tournament's final game, categorizing content and analyzing how gender was portrayed in sports journalism. Her findings highlighted significant disparities in media coverage between the men's and women's teams, most strikingly counting 118 articles on men's teams and only 51 articles on the women's.
Additional analysis also turned up a notable imbalance in article timelines, with women's coverage clustering predominantly at the tournament's end, unlike the more evenly distributed men's coverage. Perhaps most striking was House's observation about linguistic representation: in over half the articles, the women's tournament was explicitly labeled as "women's" while men's tournament articles typically omitted gender specification – suggesting an underlying assumption of men's sports as the "default" category.
Examining article topics and visual content, House found some surprising nuances. Photo coverage appeared relatively balanced between action and non-action shots. However, article themes diverged, with women's articles focusing primarily on players – highlighting stars like Caitlin Clark – while men's coverage centered more on coaches and their narratives.
For her research, House won first place, receiving a medal and a $250 prize. The project not only demonstrated her research skills but also contributed to ongoing discussions about gender representation in sports media. She credits her advisor Ikram Toumi with inspiring her. "She's the one who actually really got me interested in communications as a subject, and she really helped me with this project."
Currently preparing for graduate studies in communications, House hopes to continue exploring intercultural communication. She encourages more humanities students to participate in such research competitions, believing diverse perspectives enrich academic understanding. "There's always going to be hard sciences in these, but it's interesting to bring more humanities perspectives in."