Do judges enhance home advantage in European championship boxing?

Abstract

There have been many examples of contentious points decisions in boxing. Professional boxing is scored subjectively by judges and referees scoring each round of the contest. We assessed whether the probability of a home win (and therefore home advantage) increased when bouts were decided by points decisions rather than knockouts. Overall, we found that bouts ending in points decisions had a significantly higher proportion of home wins than those decided by a knockout, though this effect varied across time, and controlling for relative quality of boxers was only effective when using more recent data. Focusing on these data, again the probability of a home win was higher with a points decision and this effect was consistent as ''relative quality'' varied. For equally matched boxers (''relative quality'' = 0), expected probability of a home win was 0.57 for knockouts, 0.66 for technical knockouts and 0.74 for points decisions. The results of the present study lend general support to the notion that home advantage is more prevalent in sports that involve subjective decision-making. We suggest that interventions should be designed to inform judges to counter home advantage effects.

Home advantage in the Commonwealth Games

“…[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9] However, the Olympic Games is the only multi-sport competition of global significance in which the phenomenon has been extensively examined. 1,2,9 The Commonwealth Games, often referred to as the 'Friendly Games', is arguably the second most significant multi-sport international sporting competition, behind the Olympics.…”

The Home Advantage: Performance Effects in Female Collegiate Division I Gymnastics

“…There is support to suggest that subjectively judged sports are favored by a home advantage (Balmer, Nevill, & Williams, 2001;Balmer, Nevill, & Williams, 2003;Balmer et al 2005 Additionally, officials should consider which venues are selected for regional and national championships. Currently, regional championships are held at one of the venues within the six teams of that region (NAWGJ, 2007).…”

“…They found that the subjectivity and degree of bias varied depending on the referee. Similarly, Balmer et al (2005) found that boxers competing at home were more likely to be given a points decision win when a bout was not determined by a knockout. The authors concluded that judges should be provided with interventions in order to counter home advantage bias.…”

“…Reasons range from psychological effects (Bray et al 2002), nutrition (Hinton, Sanford, Davidson, Yakushko, & Beck, 2004), experience of the performer (Thelwell, Weston, Lane, & Greenlees, 2006), self-fulfilling prophecy (Gayton, Broida, & Elgee, 2001), travel fatigue (Salminen, 1993), home audience (Nevill & Holder, 1999), familiarization with the facility and equipment (Bray & Widmeyer, 2000;Gayton et al 2001), and referee bias (Balmer, Nevill, & Lane, 2005).…”

“…The authors concluded that judges should be provided with interventions in order to counter home advantage bias. In order to negate possibilities of bias, the NCAA Women's Gymnastics Committee implemented a Judges' Assignor System (JAS) in 2005(NAWGJ, 2007. Prior to this system, teams were permitted to select their own judges.…”