On Tue, 07 Aug 2012 06:22:21 -0700, Michael Britt wrote: > >While watching the olympics yesterday my wife and I noticed that while the >women teams celebrate victory with repeated hugging and lots of smiles and eye >contact, male teams hug once, little eye contact and then perhaps a few high >fives. > >I can see a Master's thesis on this. Something like "Celebratory Behavior >Among Olympic Athletes". Our observations are, of course, unscientific, so it >would be interesting to see what a more rigorous study would find as well as >what might be found across cultures. With my luck, it's probably been done >already. Dr. Palij?
You tawkin' to me? You mean something like dis? Kneidinger, Linda M., Maple, Terry L., & Tross, Stuart A. ( 2001-03-01) Touching Behavior in Sport: Functional Components, Analysis of Sex Differences, and Ethological Considerations Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 25(1), 43-62. Url: http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:1006785107778 Doi: 10.1023/A:1006785107778 Abstract: Little research exists regarding sex differences in touching behavior in sport or recreational settings. This study investigates sex differences in amounts, types, and factors influencing same-sex touching in a sport context. Subjects were 119 members of four men's college varsity baseball teams and 52 members of three women's college varsity softball teams. All touches performed on-field between team members were recorded and classified using an ethogram designed for this study. As hypothesized, statistically significant differences were found in the following areas: females performed more touching behaviors than males, almost half of the behavior types observed were performed more frequently by one sex than the other, males performed touching behaviors more frequently at away than home games, females performed touching behaviors more frequently at home than away games, and females performed more touching behaviors than males after negative game events. The findings and implications are discussed in relation to the touching behavior literature, ethology, and comparative psychology. Now, the above article was published in 2001, so I assume that there has been some follow up research (I didn't find anything but I wasn't trying real hard). I also think that for amateur sports, the NCAA might have some rules about "celebratory behavior". Even so, I don't know for sure but I assume that certain kinds of touching (e.g., high-fiving or variations) are used as team-building exercises to keep team members interacting with each other -- but someone who really knows sports psychology may know all about this. With respect to the Olympics, I watch only certain events, typically Women's Beach Volleyball and I do notice the touching there. ;-) -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] P.S. Re: men's basketball: Lithuania? WTF!!?? ;-) --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=19540 or send a blank email to leave-19540-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
