The interrelationships among type of sport skill level, sex role orientation and self-concept of female athletes

With the increase of participation by females in sport which has been dominated by males (Jackson & Marsh, 1986), concern surrounds the female's self-concept and the interaction with skill level, sport type, and sex role orientation. Based on recent literature, the concern is valid; thus, the purpose of this study was to expand on cited findings as well as introduce new interactions of skill level, sport type, sex role orientation, and self-concept. As skill level served as one independent variable, the 72 female athletes serving as subjects were sought from three southeastern schools of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), representing lesser skilled athletes, and three southeastern schools of the National Collegiate Association of Athletics (NCAA), representing the higher skilled. Considering the type of sport as another independent variable to be compared among the athletes, the female athletes from the three schools of each association (NAIA & NCAA) were from the sports of tennis and basketball. The remaining two variables, self-concept and sex role orientation, were measured by inventories which were administered in person by the researcher. The Tennessee Self-Concept Scale reflected self-concept on the dimensions of personal, physical, social, behavior, and identity. The Bem Sex Role Inventory provided the mechanism for classifying each female athlete as having a masculine, feminine, androgynous, or undifferentiated sex role orientation. A relationship was shown between sport type, skill level, and sex role orientation specifically, as the higher the skill level and/or the more masculine the sport, the greater the percentage of female athletes in the androgynous category. Results indicated that the higher skilled female athletes were stronger in social self-concept than the lesser skilled female athletes. The variable of sport type also produced significant results: (a) the higher skilled athletes of the feminine sport scored higher than the higher skilled athletes of the masculine sport in the self-concept dimension of behavior; (b) the higher skilled athletes of the masculine sport were stronger than the higher skilled athletes of the feminine sport on the physical dimension of self-concept; and (c) the lesser skilled athletes in the feminine sport had a stronger personal self-concept than the lesser skilled athletes in the masculine sport. Finally, sex role orientation was related to self-concept as both the masculine and/or androgynous oriented athletes had stronger self-concepts in the behavior dimension than the feminine and/or undifferentiated oriented athletes.