Inquiring Country Olympic profiles through the “Olympic Studies Center” data base

Statistical reports on Olympic Games (presented in different studies) are often difficult to compare. It seems therefore to be evident that a very critical point concerns to the data themselves, and the choices made by different researchers in order to summarize them in statistical reports. For this reason the analysis shown in this paper is carried out starting from the individual participation data, referred to each Olympic competition in all modern Olympic Winter Games. In order to analyze these data, the “Olympic Studies Centre” data base is used. Some methodological themes are studied: it is necessary to clarify the choices in reporting, specially referring to the count of participations or participants, to the count of only the final phases or also the other ones (like the short programs in the example) and to the count, in pairs or team competitions, of all the team members or of only one unit for the group. Another warning concerns the disciplines, which have sometimes changed during the modern Olympic period. So in an analysis of the discipline profiles it is necessary to pay attention to the ones which were more recently introduced or which were not present for many editions. Then, considering associations between disciplines and Countries, it is important to take into account whether some later participant Countries seem to show stricter relationships than the others with the disciplines more recently introduced, and this because the analysis can be drawn only on the data concerning the last time period.