Embracing diversity – watch your language: understanding student sports teams

The student experience extends beyond the curriculum. Engagement with student sports teams can enrich aspects of university life while also developing graduate attributes. However, there have also been reports of discriminatory behaviour and poor use of language in university sports teams. Abertay University’s sports team members were surveyed regarding their knowledge of, and attitudes toward, protected characteristics in advance of awareness-raising interventions that included students working with a group with protected characteristics in the community. The survey was then re-administered. The results of the survey revealed that Abertay University sports team members responded significantly differently to their Scottish peers in the general population on questions about whether equal opportunities for women, for BME groups, and for gay men and lesbian women had gone too far. They also had significantly different responses to questions regarding positive action to enable employment for BME groups, for gay men and lesbian women and for those who had experienced depression.