A Content Analysis of the Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport: 1992-2016

Abstract

As the flagship journal of the Sport and Recreation Law Association, the Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport (JLAS) serves “…as an interdisciplinary outlet for legal issues in the sport, recreation, and related fields to meet the needs of researchers, academicians, practitioners, and policymakers” (About JLAS, para. 2). A study by Batista and Pittman (2006) identified JLAS as the most highly ranked sport law journal among journals focusing on sport management. Articles appearing in the Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport have informed court decisions and case outcomes, policy decisions and debate on limited liability legislation, health and safety issues, and universal access to sport opportunities (Spengler & Miller, 2014). Additionally, JLAS articles have been cited in journals published in a variety of countries including India, China, Australia, France, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Spain (Spengler & Miller, 2014). These inclusions indicate that the Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport has had some degree of success in attaining international recognition and appeal. Although JLAS has been published since 1992, a complete formal analysis of the content has never been conducted. A content analysis of JLAS may provide critical information regarding the diversity of topics covered, the specific research types utilized, demographic information regarding the authors published, and perhaps identify any gaps that may exist in the current literature base. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to conduct a content analysis of articles published in the Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport (JLAS) from 1992-2016.

Perspective: National Football League Teams Need Chief Diversity Officers

“…Content analysis has become a popular method for qualitative and quantitative analyses in management and international business research (Gaur and Kumar, 2018 ). Prior studies within the sport management field have also utilized this method (Pederson and Pitts, 2001 ; Peetz and Reams, 2011 ; Miller et al, 2018 ; Williams et al, 2021 ).…”

Content Analysis of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in the Recreational Sports Journal, 2005–2019

“…It is a systematic and quantitative research method (Vaismoradi et al, 2013). The method has been applied to a range of equity, diversity, and inclusion issues (Rosa et al, 2016;Taylor, 2003), including issues specific to physical activity and recreation (Bruning et al, 2020;Cardinal et al, 2009Gietzen et al, 2017;Kamphoff et al, 2010;Miller et al, 2019;Thomas & Cardinal, 2020;White & Cardinal, 2003).…”

“…Gender was assumed on the basis of the first names of the authors (Wais, 2016). Because an author's gender may reflect the nature and types of research questions being asked, and female and male scholars are widely observed to publish at different rates (Miller et al, 2019), potential problems emerge, such as the one-way mirror phenomenon whereby certain voices dominate the published literature (Valentine et al, 1999;Williams et al, 2018).…”