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The Fun Factor

November 14, 2014

My experience with school-age young people is that what they seek most from sports participation is fun and friends. More sophisticated research from many sources consistently has affirmed my less formal findings.

The Journal of Physical Activity & Health added a July study to the body of research. This work was conducted by George Washington University in Washington, DC, and focused on organized soccer.

What was so surprising about this study is not that winning was not at the top of the list of what makes sports enjoyable for youth, but that winning ranked 48th of 81 factors measured. Winning didn’t even make it in the top half!

The lead author of the study, Associate Professor of Sports Psychology Amanda Visek, was quoted by the Chicago Tribune to say “the fun experience is not determined by the result of a game but rather by the process of physically engaging in the game.”

Tribune writer Danielle Braff quotes this research and other expert commentary that coalesces around the consensus that it is parents, not athletes or coaches, who are most hung up on the outcome of the game, as well as the issues that create the pressure on young people that ruins the pleasure of play: position, playing time and prospects of making an elite team or earning a college scholarship.

That’s the stuff parents worry about much more than their kids. And, according to a growing body of research, some of which we've cited in this space before, that’s the stuff that causes many kids to quit organized sports. It’s not fun anymore.

A Hot Topic

July 10, 2012

It is a terrible irony that Georgia saw two of its high school football players die late last summer when it’s the Georgia High School Association that was providing us with the best information we’ve ever had about the risks of heat illness and death.

The deaths occurred in the third year of a thorough three-year study in Georgia that is reinforcing common sense. The study is confirming who is most at risk and when they’re most at risk.

  • Who is most at risk? Linemen more than other players; underclassmen more than older players; those who have had the flu or similar sickness more than others.
  • When are they most at risk? During the season’s first week more than the second. During the second practice of a double session day more than the first. During the second half of the second practice more than the first half, and, early in the morning when humidity is often highest.

It all makes perfect sense: the chubby 9th or 10th grader during the second half of the second practice during the first week of the season. And because it’s statistically predictable, heat illness is almost entirely preventable.

There is some danger here in over-generalizing and over-simplifying, but awareness of these tendencies will help coaches to schedule and administrators to legislate around high-risk scenarios. We expect both will be happening in Michigan.