The report, commissioned by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), showed that social media abuse aimed at athletes has risen considerably in recent years with up to one-third of posts now containing negative content targeted towards sporting stars.
Researchers found that abusive social media posts included primarily hateful, discriminatory, and emotional forms of harassment, especially towards female athletes.
The study deployed a two-part research approach involving digital analysis of social media posts and semi-structured interviews with informed practitioners engaged in safeguarding athletes from social media hate.
Andrea Geurin, Professor in Sport Business and Director of the Institute for Sport Business, Loughborough University London, explained the findings:
“Our research confirmed that online abuse towards athletes is quite prevalent, which can have long-lasting damaging effects on them.
“Meanwhile, sport organisations and governing bodies are struggling to keep up with this abuse from a safeguarding perspective. Based on our findings we developed recommendations to help sport organisations address the issue more comprehensively, and therefore better protect athletes’ mental, emotional and physical health.”
Academics have suggested that sport organisations can improve their safeguarding by developing harm reduction policies emphasising responsibility, collaboration, education, and responsiveness.
Further research could also reveal how abuse suffered by athletes may differ across various social media platforms and outside of competition windows.
The Loughborough research team included Dr Emily Hayday, Dr Lauren Burch, Professor Aaron Smith, and Professor Andrea Geurin.
