Socio-Economic Factors Affecting Women’s Participation in Sports Activities in Lahore

Abstract

Women in Pakistan have been subjected to gender discrimination in different aspects of their lives, including their participation in sports. The main purpose of this study is to assess the socio-economic barriers hindering participation of women in sports activities.  To this end, we adopted the survey design method. The idea behind this study is feminism in sports theory. The feminist approach to women’s participation in sports is focused on empowering women both inside and outside of the sports world, advancing gender equity, and arguing for equitable chances in sports. SMART-PLS 4, SPSS, and RStudio are used for data analysis. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is used within structural equation model (SEM) to evaluate the hypotheses. The results revealed that women’s participation in sports is highly influenced by family influence, socio-cultural support, economic barriers, personal interest and motivation, and sexual harassment, while media coverage and wage inequality is insignificant. Sexual harassment and economic barriers negatively affects participation of women in sports. The results suggest that policy makers, sports governing bodies, universities, and society should work together to increase female sports participation by raising awareness, reducing economic barriers, and improving physical health and fitness. There is gap in understanding the socio-economic barriers that contribute to the low participation of women in sports activities in Lahore, Pakistan. This research include factors socio-cultural support, family influence, wage inequality, sexual harassment, media coverage, personal interest and motivation and economic barriers that hindering women’s sport participation in Lahore.