National Bias of International Gymnastics Judges during the 2013-2016 Olympic Cycle

Abstract

National bias in sports judging is a well-known issue and has been observed in several sports: judges, in the aggregate, give higher marks to athletes of the same nationality. In this work, we study the national bias of international gymnastics judges during the 2013-2016 Olympic cycle. As opposed to prior work, our analysis leverages the intrinsic variance of the judging error based on the performance level of the gymnasts for each apparatus and discipline. The magnitude of the national bias varies across judges, nations and disciplines. While acrobatics and trampoline do not exhibit any bias, we observe considerable bias by aerobics, artistics and rhythmics judges. In aerobic and artistic gymnastics this bias further increases for the best athletes competing in the finals. On the positive side, we show that judges are unbiased against direct competitors of their own gymnasts. Our approach could easily be applied to other sports that incorporate a judging panel and objective judging guidelines. It could help sports federations and the public at large understand the extent of national bias and identify particularly prone judges or nations.