University Research Project on Transgender Inclusion in Cricket

[Unistudent500]

Hi everyone:

I am a student at the University of South Australia, and I am posting here to see if you would be interested in participating in my short survey. I received permission from the moderators and this project has been approved by the University of South Australia's Human Research Ethics Committee Ethics Protocol 203610.

My research topic is exploring transgender inclusion in the AFL and Cricket Australia. This entails analysing policy documents, news media articles, and collecting and understanding fans thoughts and perspectives on this matter. To collect and understand fans views on transgender inclusion, I have created a survey that should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The survey is completely voluntary, and if you decide to participate, you will remain entirely anonymous. The only information collected will be your gender, age range, Australian state of residence, and favourite cricket team. The main part of the survey will contain three open-ended questions that simply ask you your thoughts and perspectives on the inclusion of transgender athletes in cricket and broader sport.

For more information about the study and your participation, please click the link to the survey:

https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

Thank you for your time.

 

[Unistudent500]

Hi everyone:

I am a student at the University of South Australia, and I am posting here to see if you would be interested in participating in my short survey. I received permission from the moderators and this project has been approved by the University of South Australia's Human Research Ethics Committee Ethics Protocol 203610.

My research topic is exploring transgender inclusion in the AFL and Cricket Australia. This entails analysing policy documents, news media articles, and collecting and understanding fans thoughts and perspectives on this matter. To collect and understand fans views on transgender inclusion, I have created a survey that should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The survey is completely voluntary, and if you decide to participate, you will remain entirely anonymous. The only information collected will be your gender, age range, Australian state of residence, and favourite cricket team. The main part of the survey will contain three open-ended questions that simply ask you your thoughts and perspectives on the inclusion of transgender athletes in cricket and broader sport.

For more information about the study and your participation, please click the link to the survey:

https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

Thank you for your time.

Survey is still live if anyone can spare a few minutes! Thanks to those who have checked it out and shared their thoughts.

 

[Gough]

Can we help a cricket fan out here please fellas.

 

[Chief]

Give it a go guys.

 

[PhatBoy]

Done

 

[Unistudent500]

Done

Really appreciate that. Thank you for taking the time.

 

[Walt Kowalski]

Hi everyone:

I am a student at the University of South Australia, and I am posting here to see if you would be interested in participating in my short survey. I received permission from the moderators and this project has been approved by the University of South Australia's Human Research Ethics Committee Ethics Protocol 203610.

My research topic is exploring transgender inclusion in the AFL and Cricket Australia. This entails analysing policy documents, news media articles, and collecting and understanding fans thoughts and perspectives on this matter. To collect and understand fans views on transgender inclusion, I have created a survey that should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The survey is completely voluntary, and if you decide to participate, you will remain entirely anonymous. The only information collected will be your gender, age range, Australian state of residence, and favourite cricket team. The main part of the survey will contain three open-ended questions that simply ask you your thoughts and perspectives on the inclusion of transgender athletes in cricket and broader sport.

For more information about the study and your participation, please click the link to the survey:

https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

Thank you for your time.

Done. Some interesting questions. All the best with your research.

 

[The hands of stone]

Done , good luck . Hadn't really given it any thought before tbh

 

[Walt Kowalski]

Hi everyone:

I am a student at the University of South Australia, and I am posting here to see if you would be interested in participating in my short survey. I received permission from the moderators and this project has been approved by the University of South Australia's Human Research Ethics Committee Ethics Protocol 203610.

My research topic is exploring transgender inclusion in the AFL and Cricket Australia. This entails analysing policy documents, news media articles, and collecting and understanding fans thoughts and perspectives on this matter. To collect and understand fans views on transgender inclusion, I have created a survey that should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The survey is completely voluntary, and if you decide to participate, you will remain entirely anonymous. The only information collected will be your gender, age range, Australian state of residence, and favourite cricket team. The main part of the survey will contain three open-ended questions that simply ask you your thoughts and perspectives on the inclusion of transgender athletes in cricket and broader sport.

For more information about the study and your participation, please click the link to the survey:

https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

Thank you for your time.

I don't know if you want this to be a discussion here, but the biggest concern is player safety. I've always been of the opinion that adults can live their life as they please, providing they don't hurt others. I'm all for inclusion is almost all aspects of life. However, there does seem to be a general concern in the community that in sports, M>F transgender athletes may possess unfair physical attributes if competing in a woman's competition. Not only that they may be physically stronger, bigger and faster and thus make the competition unfair, but also that they could cause significant injury/death due to being stronger/bigger/faster.

There was a quote in the survey (I cant get back in to see the actual quote) that said something along the lines of "trans rights override these concerns". I don't think that's an acceptable position at all, and it's a very shallow and selfish position to take. A rational, scientific position must surely be possible, and indeed from a WHS and duty of care position, absolutely vital to protect sportspeople.

Interested in your thoughts on this or what your research has shown.

 

[Richard Pryor]

I don't know if you want this to be a discussion here, but the biggest concern is player safety. I've always been of the opinion that adults can live their life as they please, providing they don't hurt others. I'm all for inclusion is almost all aspects of life. However, there does seem to be a general concern in the community that in sports, M>F transgender athletes may possess unfair physical attributes if competing in a woman's competition. Not only that they may be physically stronger, bigger and faster and thus make the competition unfair, but also that they could cause significant injury/death due to being stronger/bigger/faster.

There was a quote in the survey (I cant get back in to see the actual quote) that said something along the lines of "trans rights override these concerns". I don't think that's an acceptable position at all, and it's a very shallow and selfish position to take. A rational, scientific position must surely be possible, and indeed from a WHS and duty of care position, absolutely vital to protect sportspeople.

Interested in your thoughts on this or what your research has shown.

While I feel this discussion has been more or less done to death on the AFL Board (although I will add while cricket is a "non-contact" sport I do feel the same safety issues potentially arise due to fast bowling, although it is much less of an issue than in contact sports) I concur that I would be interested to see results of research if unistudent is permitted to share them.

 

[PhatBoy]

Cricket is a more quality dependent sport when it comes to the physical dangers.

You can break bones at any level of afl football. A danger exacerbated by putting female bodies up against men.

In cricket as there are many competitions that have women playing against men, women do not play a grade of cricket that they cannot physically handle

 

[Walt Kowalski]

Cricket is a more quality dependent sport when it comes to the physical dangers.

You can break bones at any level of afl football. A danger exacerbated by putting female bodies up against men.

In cricket as there are many competitions that have women playing against men, women do not play a grade of cricket that they cannot physically handle

As a genuine question, what standard do you think a state women's cricket team would be competitive in in men's comps?

 

[PhatBoy]

As a genuine question, what standard do you think a state women's cricket team would be competitive in in men's comps?

They would compete with our first grade I think (major regional centre in nsw) with the bat no question.

 

[Unistudent500]

Done. Some interesting questions. All the best with your research.

Thank you very much. I'm glad you found it interesting. All the best to you too.

 

[Unistudent500]

Done , good luck . Hadn't really given it any thought before tbh

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts even if it isn't something you've thought a lot about. I think it is still important to hear what you have to say.

 

[Unistudent500]

While I feel this discussion has been more or less done to death on the AFL Board (although I will add while cricket is a "non-contact" sport I do feel the same safety issues potentially arise due to fast bowling, although it is much less of an issue than in contact sports) I concur that I would be interested to see results of research if unistudent is permitted to share them.

I would have to check and make sure what I put in ethics regarding sharing the research when it is finished. There is the potential I could post a summary of the results on this forum for you all to take a look at. I may not be able to do that though. I know in my ethics I said that if you did the survey, I can answer research questions (possibly results) by email. You can private message me and I can share my email with you if you didn't get it from the survey.

 

[Unistudent500]

Survey is still open! There have been some great responses so far. It will take no more than 10 minutes.

 

[Unistudent500]

Still looking for more responses if you've got some time!

 

[Unistudent500]

While I feel this discussion has been more or less done to death on the AFL Board (although I will add while cricket is a "non-contact" sport I do feel the same safety issues potentially arise due to fast bowling, although it is much less of an issue than in contact sports) I concur that I would be interested to see results of research if unistudent is permitted to share them.

Just wanted to let you (and everyone) know that I will post a summary of my thesis on this forum. Shouldn't be an ethical issue. Survey is still open and I would love to hear from anyone.

Once this survey is closed, I look forward to engaging on this forum. I've only been reading, and it seems like a great community.

 

[Unistudent500]

Hi all! Just wanted to share that the survey is still open if you didn't get a chance to fill it out the first time around.
Here is the link: https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

 

[Bareth Garry]

Done

 

[Unistudent500]

This is my last call for gathering survey responses. I'm going to be wrapping up collection soon. If you didn't get a chance to fill out the survey and wanted to, you've still got time!

Here is the link: https://doit.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Xth6txnUYB5Ayi

Thanks again everyone!

 

[Unistudent500]

Hi everyone,

Apologies for the long delay in coming back and posting a results summary update. There were hiccups throughout the process, but the research has now been completed and submitted to examiners. Thank you again for those that participated, and the mods and admins for allowing me to post here.

What I am going to do is provide a simple summary of the results from the surveys that you participated in (found below), and when an article is written in the future, it shall be posted here so you can see the progress of the research. If you have any concerns or questions that you don’t want to post here, please feel free to email me at maccj014@mymail.unisa.edu.au



This research analysed AFL and Cricket Australia (CA) policies, Australian news media, and fans’ perspectives on trans inclusion in sport. To ascertain footy and cricket fans’ perspectives, two different but similar surveys were created: a footy fan survey and a cricket fan survey. The surveys were qualitative in nature, meaning fans wrote out their ideas, thoughts, and feelings in open-ended text boxes to question prompts. After cleaning the data (removing unfinished surveys) there were 123 footy responses and 97 cricket responses (n=220). The results from the surveys were complex and mixed.

In total, over 60% of fans surveyed shared explicitly negative attitudes towards the inclusion of trans people in sport. For fans that demonstrated positive sentiments towards trans inclusion, this was most often displayed as support for the policy changes that have taken place in the AFL and CA, and a desire for respect and inclusion of trans people. Some fans from this cohort elaborated that inclusion should focus on making trans people feel welcome, and implored sport organizations to do more for trans people.

There was a difference in the amount of positive sentiment between footy and cricket with surveyed cricket fans being more inclined to advocate for full inclusion than footy fans. This difference between cricket fans and AFL fans may be because cricket has a longer history of taking on inclusive initiatives, the contemporary work CA has done around LGBTQ+ inclusion, or the difference in rules compared to football (i.e., non-contact vs. contact—a point raised by a number of fans in the surveys).

The surveys differed from the news media as the fans demonstrated more diversity in sentiment and displayed more scepticism and rejection towards the inclusion of trans people. This was most often shared as concerns towards the inclusion of trans women in women’s sport (e.g., concerns around testosterone management and other biological and physiological factors), and at times, these concerns would be vitriolic and transphobic. The vitriolic responses would most often misgender purposefully, question the legitimacy of trans athletes (or trans identities entirely), or use slurs.

However, whether participants displayed positive or negative sentiments towards inclusion, most responses believed there needed to be rules and eligibility criteria for trans people’s inclusion in sport, especially for trans women. How these rules would apply and what aspects they would focus on differed, but many responses highlighted the desire for rules in elite sport and community sport (sometimes wanting them to differ, other times wanting them to be the same across levels), that focused on testosterone or other physiological controls (e.g., size, strength, etc.), and evaluated the genuineness or time of transition (i.e., whether it was before or after puberty). And while some advocated for limited rules, or no rules at all, others wanted sport organizations to form stringent rules that fell along strict lines of biological sex. What was prevalent in many of these responses was the belief that men are inherently better performers of sport, and that this needs to be controlled for trans people to be included.

In summary, while there was positive sentiment towards the inclusion of trans people in sport generally, and a smaller minority believing that sport needs to do more to make trans people feel welcome, there were also a great number of people that demonstrated scepticism or disdain towards including trans people (specifically, trans women), especially in football. And while most believed there needed to be rules in place for inclusion, some believed that rules should focus on sex and exclude trans people from playing in the category that matches their gender.



Thank you once again for participating and allowing me to share my research on this forum. I look forward to sharing some of the work that stems from this.