The Development of Women's Sports: Content Analysis of Research in the Last Decade

This study aimed to analyze the content of research conducted over the past decade on the development of women’s sports. The research corpus consisted of articles sourced from databases including Civilica, the Regional Information Center for Science and Technology, the Comprehensive Portal of Humanities, the Scientific Information Database of Jahad Daneshgahi as well as various journals in sports management, management, sociology, and related fields. The keywords “development of women’s sports,” “development of female sports,” “barriers and factors affecting the development of women’s sports,” and “women’s participation in sports” were used to search the aforementioned databases. A total of 85 articles were then examined and analyzed using content analysis. The findings revealed that the research could be categorized into seven areas relevant to the development of women’s sports: influential factors, barriers to development, women’s participation in sports, technology and media, strategies, and challenges. Among the relevant publications, the Journal of Sport Management Studies, Strategic Studies of Youth Sports, the Journal of Sport Management, and Communication Management in Sports Media published the most articles focused on women’s sports. The majority of articles in this field were published within the last three years, and quantitative research methods were employed in over 42.35% of the studies. These results indicate that the field has garnered significant attention from researchers in recent years, suggesting a growing recognition of women’s sports development as an area of research. However, the study also highlights a continued need for increased focus on the challenges and strategies required for further development.