The medical journal Research in Sports Medicine recently published a study that finds women soccer players are half as likely to fake an injury than male soccer players. The Journal's researchers drew their conclusions by watching a representative sample of match-videos, counting injuries from games, observing how long players were out of games with reproted injuries, and taking note of whether or not players left the pitch with visible blood. The injuries vs. "injury simulations" (read:" flopping," though FIFA prefers the term "injury simulations") were then ranked based on plausibility. Kinda gives a whole new meaning to the "playing like a girl" thing. Here's more details, via BoingBoing:

"While it was difficult to know for certain if a player had a true injury or was faking or embellishing, we found that only 13.7 percent of apparent injuries met our definition for a 'definite' injury," Rosenbaum said. "Also consider that we saw six apparent injuries per match in the 2007 Women's World Cup but team physicians from the tournament reported only 2.3 injuries per match, so it looks like there may be some simulation in the women's game."

Rosenbaum's research indicates that apparent injury incidents for women are much less frequent than for men, however, occurring at a rate of 5.74 per match as compared to 11.26 per men's match. The proportion of apparent injuries that were classified as "definite" was nearly twice as high for women, 13.7 percent, as compared to 7.2 percent for men.

Interesting enough, the report follows on the heels of a "This American Life" series on flopping in the NBA. Read a transcript or listen to it here.