JACLYN HADFIELD

“As women with an innate interest in sport and exercise, we need to remember the girls who did not have access to sports, were picked last in gym class, and grew up to be women who did not identify as being athletic.”

Meet, Dr Jaclyn Hadfield, a multilingual cross-cultural behavioural scientist who assesses women’s physical activity beliefs and behaviours. Her research aims to identify salient factors to inclusively influence intervention designs and improve women’s physical activity behavioral engagement while reducing health disparities domestically and globally.

CHANGING THE CULTURE OF WOMEN’S EXERCISE

“My journey aims to usher all women into positive relationships with exercise. I do this by identifying the unseen issues embedded in society throughout history so women can connect those issues to their inner dialogues with their bodies, how they move, and overall health to positively change the culture of women’s exercise.”

WHAT CHANGES DO WE NEED TO SEE?

“There is still an emphasis on women's aesthetics in sports and fitness. Culturally, women's bodies are put on display and objectified. Since culture is powerfully communicated in visual formats, the visual representation of women in sports and fitness media can be a tool to address issues of gender equity by combatting female objectification and aesthetically focused content.”

THE NARRATIVE OF WOMEN’S SPORTS

“Women are being championed more than ever in the media. We hear things like, ‘women sports are being taken more seriously and becoming more popular.’ While this can be viewed as a positive step for women in sports, we still battle the narrative that our participation in sports is questioned and critiqued as being less serious, while men do not face this narrative, which implies that our participation is sub-par to men.”