Sports and Race: Implicit biases of NBA refs

by Rajeev Ravisankar, Research Assistant at the Kirwan Institute



Something that has interested me for some time but is often overlooked is the intersection of race and sports. For many progressives, this intersection might even seem irrelevant considering professional sports reinforce the worst forms of wealth concentration and disparity that have become a fundamental aspect of our society. In addition, some have gone so far as to suggest, in what can be described as reformulation of Marxian ideology, that sports are the real opiate of the masses.

As someone who became a sports fan while growing up, but recently took a step back toward a more analytical approach, sports are very revealing of attitudes, biases, and norms in society. However, they also offer prescriptive mechanisms to address the problems that exist.

Let’s take a recent example to illustrate this point. A study conducted by a professor from Wharton School of Business and a graduate student from Cornell, which analyzed data from 1991 to 2004, suggests that white referees in the National Basketball Association called fouls on black players at a higher rate than they did on white players. The two researchers stated that the bias “is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew assigned to the game.”
(Source: “Study of NBA Sees Racial Bias in Calling Fouls” by Alan Schwarz)

The study clearly illustrates how deeply embedded race is in our society and the impact that it has in decision-making. The snap judgments by referees that were analyzed are indicative of subconscious racial attitudes which are related to the broader concept of implicit association bias. While foul-calling and game outcomes are affected by implicit biases in the NBA, it is perhaps more instructive to consider the impact that such biases have on employment, education, housing, healthcare, criminal justice, etc.

Aside from implicit biases, there are other ways that this example is revealing with respect to race. One question that hardly came up was why whites continue to be overrepresented in positions on and off the court as referees and owners in a game where the players are predominately African-American. This trend is connected to historically rooted notions of black intellectual inferiority which continue to be pervasive in the current context. It is also reflective of the disproportionate level of exclusion we see across the institutional spectrum.

The situation in sports indicates that a person of color cannot buy their way to a position where they are immune to racial discrimination. With this in mind, how can we use sports as a mechanism for change? First, because of the sheer number of fans, sports can be used to broaden the discourse around race and bring more people to the table. Also, there have been interventions in both collegiate and professional sports seeking to redress disparities along the lines of race and gender. In addition, sports provide a number of minority role models in high positions who can serve as de-biasing agents. This is especially important in a context that requires both deconstruction of existing norms and a new kind of socialization process.