The Economist - USA (2022-02-12)

TheEconomistFebruary12th 2022

Graphic detail The Winter Olympics

81

Whowilljudge

the judges?

I

maginehurlingyourselfdowna slope

on skis for 100 metres—then running out

of  ground.  You  must  drop  into  the  frigid

air, glide at a speed of 90kmph for five sec­

onds,  and  somehow  land  gracefully  100

metres downhill. Winning a gold medal for

ski jumping requires fearlessness, a quali­

ty  very  much  in  keeping  with  Olympian

ideals. But some athletes may be helped by

biased judging, which is not.

Ski  jumping  is  scored  not  just  on  the

distance  leapt,  but  on  style,  which  ac­

counts for around two­fifths of an athlete’s

score. That aesthetic judgment is made by

a panel of five judges of different national­

ities, who assess each jump on a scale of 0

to  20.  The  best  and  worst  scores  are  dis­

carded, in an attempt to neutralise individ­

ual  bias.  Yet  some  still  persists.  Judges,

shockingly,  seem  to  favour  athletes  from

their home countries. 

That is the assessment of a recent paper

by  Alex  Krumer  of  Molde  University  Col­

lege in Norway, along with two colleagues,

after  examining  15,355  ski  jumps  in  men’s

competitions held from 2010 to 2017. After

controlling for factors such as the leniency

of individual judges and the quality of ski­

jumpers,theyfoundthatnationalistbias

wasmodestbutwidespread.Theaverage

biaswasanadditional0.1points.Nearly

halfofjudgesfavouredcompatriotsina

waythatwasstatisticallysignificant.

AttheWinterOlympics(whicharecur­

rently beingheldinBeijing), patriotism

mayrunespeciallyhigh,andbiasseemsto

increase.Whenweaugmentedthestudy

by adding more Olympic results to the

originaldata,wefoundthataveragebias

nearlydoubledto0.18points.TheEcono-

mist askedtheFédération Internationale

deSki(fis), thesport’sgoverningbody,for

comment.fissaiditwasunawareofthe

paperanddeclinedfurthercomment.

Biasdiffersmarkedlybycountry.The

greatestfavouritism,accordingtotheau­

thors ofthestudy, comesfromRussian

judges,whoawardanadditional0.2points

onaverage.PolishandFrenchjudgesarein

themiddleofthepack.ThetypicalNorwe­

gianorFinnishjudgedemonstratesnode­

tectablebias.Interestingly,thebiasofa

country’sski­jumpingjudgesiscorrelated

withthatcountry’soveralllevelofcorrup­

tion,asmeasuredbyTransparencyInter­

national’sCorruptionPerceptionsIndex.

Widespreadfavouritismrarelyaffects

theresults,however.Therearetworeasons

forthis.First,thebiasissmallincompari­

sonwiththenaturalvariationinjudges’

scoresthatoccursbychance(roughly0.3

points).Second,thediscardingofthehigh­

estandlowestscoresmeansthatespecially

biasedscoresareoftennotcounted.Our

counterfactualanalysisofthe 203 compe­

titionsexaminedbetween 2010 and2017,in

which nationalist bias was eliminated,

foundthatonly 14 medals(or2.3%)would

havechangedhands.

Thisishardlythefirstfindingofbiasin

sport—or eventhe mostegregious. One

studyonfigureskating,anotherOlympic

event,foundthatnationalistfavouritism

wasroughly 60%largerthanitisinski

jumping.Anotherpaper,firstpublishedin

2007,foundthatAmericanrefereesforthe

National Basketball Association (nba)

calledfewerfoulsagainstplayersoftheir

ownrace.Afterwidespreadmediaatten­

tion,thenbachangeditspoliciesforre­

viewingcontestedcalls.A follow­uppaper

sixyearslaterfoundthatthisbiashaddis­

appearedentirely.Admissionisoftenthe

firststeptorecovery.n

Nationalism affects the scoring of

winter sports

0

10

20

30

-0.3 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4

Additionalpointsgiventocompatriots*

Biasedtowards

compatriots

Biased

against

Numberofjudges

K-point Fallline

1

2

3

4



→Eliteskijumpingisa har sport.Bu dg

Anatomyofa skijump

Biasofski-jumpjudges

2010-17

Stagesofa skijump

*Averagecomparedwithotherjudgesmarkingthesamejump Source:“Nationalisticbiasamong

internationalexperts”,byA.Krumer,F.Otto& T.Pawlowski,ScandinavianJournalofEconomics, 2021

Nottoscale

rrowi sp ut athletescangeta nudgefrom the judge

2.Take-off

Thetake-offslopeis angled

downwards.Skiersmust

extendtheirbodysothat

theylaunchupwards

1.In-run

Skierscrouchtominimise

dragandgainthemaximum

amountofspeed

3.Flight

Jumpersangletheirskisintoa

“ V”.Thispositiontookoff

duringthe190swhenit was

foundtoproducemorelift

4.Landing

Skiersdelaylandinguntilthe

lastmoment.Marksare

awardedforhowfarthey

landbeyondtheK-point

. Out-run

Judges continue to rate

skiers on their style until

they pass the fall line

Corruption v judges’ nationalistic bias

Austria

Switzerland

Czech

Republic

Germany

Finland

France

Italy

Japan

Norway

Poland

Russia

Slovenia

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

30 40 50 60 70 80 90

CorruptionPerceptions Index, average between 2012-1

9% confidence

← Perceived as

more corrupt