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The Role of Physical Attractiveness in Tennis TV-Viewership

Author

Listed:
  • Helmut Dietl

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

  • Anil Özdemir

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

  • Andrew Rendall

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

Abstract

What is beautiful is good, the ancient Greek lyric poet Sappho wrote over 2,500 years ago. Studies in social sciences, anthropology, psychology, and economics have shown various effects of physical attractiveness. Physically attractive people are hired more often, receive faster promotion, and generally earn more per hour; thus, there is a beauty premium. However, within the context of sports, little is known about consumer preferences concerning athletes’ physical attractiveness. In this study, we analyze 622 live tennis matches from 66 Grand Slam tournaments between 2000 and 2016, examining the relationship between attractiveness, measured by tennis players’ facial symmetry, and TV-viewership. We show that facial symmetry plays a positive role for female matches while there is no significant effect for male matches. The effect persists in several subsample regressions and robustness checks. Our results have important implications for managers in the field of sports. TV-broadcasters will likely acknowledge additional revenue potential from advertising due to increased viewership and change their programming accordingly. We contribute to the sports management and economics literature in that we introduce a new method to measure facial symmetry and show that physical attractiveness plays a positive role in tennis TV-viewership.

Suggested Citation

  • Helmut Dietl & Anil Özdemir & Andrew Rendall, 2018. "The Role of Physical Attractiveness in Tennis TV-Viewership," Working Papers 376, University of Zurich, Department of Business Administration (IBW).
    • Handle: RePEc:zrh:wpaper:376
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Guodong Guo & Brad R. Humphreys & Qiangchang Wang & Yang Zhou, 2023. "Attractive or Aggressive? A Face Recognition and Machine Learning Approach for Estimating Returns to Visual Appearance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 24(6), pages 737-758, August.
    2. Pieper, Marco & Schulze, Günther G., 2024. "Performance and beauty in sports ̶on the market value and popularity of European female soccer players," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 218(C), pages 309-324.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    physical attractiveness; demand; consumer discrimination; tennis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L83 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Sports; Gambling; Restaurants; Recreation; Tourism
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • Z2 - Other Special Topics - - Sports Economics

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