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Over the last two decades the growth of youth sports has reflected the popularity of professional sports in our society. Sporting events and news are available to the public twenty-four hours a day on television and radio: sports are an enormous industry. The outstanding popularity of the sports industry has profoundly affected youth sports organizations. An estimated twenty-five million children age six through eighteen participate in at least one school or community based athletic program. These numbers increase exponentially as the age of boys and girls entering sports keeps falling. In order to supervise, teach and manage these athletes about 2. 5 million coaches spend an average of eighty hours a season with them.
The majority of these coaches volunteer for programs organized by the community, religious organizations, and recreational facilities. Without a national agency to coordinate sports programs, there exists great variation in the manner in which sponsoring agencies organize their teams, thus leaving plenty of opportunity for too much parental and coach control. Agencies have quickly moved American youth from unstructured play to highly organized competition. This infrastructure (or over structure) of organized youth sports is the backbone for criticism and praise by professional athletes, physicians, and psychologists. There are many that feel organized sports can be very beneficial. Lyle Michael, associate professor at Harvard Medical School, strongly supports organized sports for youth.
He claims that sports aid in the development of social and interpersonal skills, health fitness and psychological well-being. The more evident benefits involve individual skill development, greater physical fitness, and higher self esteem. Other benefits include development of group cooperation teamwork and friendship-making skills. Many feel that self-esteem and self-image can be greatly improved through sports. Psychologists around the country stress a need for an active life style to develop healthy self-images. Eric Margenau, a psychologist and author, feels that early and frequent exposure to sports is the key to personal growth.
Sports introduce children to healthy competition. A childs failure in competition helps them learn to win gracefully and lose with honor. It teaches youngsters that through perseverance and determination they can win next time. These lessons that children learn will stay with them throughout their lifetime.
Some skeptics criticize the very premise of competition is hazardous to a childs psychological and emotional well-being. The critics of sports emphasize the detrimental affects of competition and the negative influence of untrained coaches and pushy parents. There are a huge number of children playing sports, but due to burnout, stress, psychological trauma, and lowered self-esteem as many as seventy-three percent quit sports by the age of thirteen. Rick Wolff, a former professional baseball player and coach, claims there are several factors contributing to this phenomenon such as: parents and coaches putting excessive pressure on children, specialization in one sport, over competitiveness, anxiety and loss of interest. This lack of interest may stem from the fact that they are cut from a team, injured, or receive little playing time. Another reason for high dropout rates is the structure of the programs.
The sports programs are set up by adults, run by adults, and maintained by adults with a precise date and time. Spontaneous play and creativity are taken out of the equation. Coaches are choosing who plays and who doesnt in an effort to win. A study found that 90 % of all children would rather be on a losing team if they got to play. Alfie Kohn, author of No Contest, claims that competition is the downfall of sports. It is the very core of sports to produce a winner and a loser.
Competition forces children to rely on external sources to feel good about themselves. It also causes youth to view others as obstacles to their personal success. Winners gloat and losers sulk, or quit. The majority will end up losers and this fosters self-doubt, thus a decrease in esteem. Those that do win often rely on competing to define their self worth. It is stressed that children love to compete, but research tells a different story.
Dr Orlick found that an astounding 95 % of children preferred to participate in noncompetitive activities than structured competition. Dr. Orlick is a huge advocate of noncompetitive play. He wants the stress to be on group cooperation striving toward a common goal. An example of this is musical chairs. However, the game is structured so that children try to get all players on the fewest amount of chairs.
Children are still learning skills and strategies, but there are no losers-only winners. Many other critics of the emphasis of sports in American youth are concerned not only with the structure of sports, but the negative stereotypes that many professional athletes portray. Professional athletes directly affect other sports programs. Many professional athletes are perfect examples of the influence and dangers of competition. Many professionals walk around with an aura of superiority. Their self-centered ness and egos derived from competition force them into a what-all-cost mentality.
Mike Tyson bit an ear of an opponent, while John Macenroe screams, cusses, and is disrespectful of the linesman at every point. If sports teach children to lose gracefully, what message do these actions send? Karl Malone warns professional athletes that they are in the spot light whether they like it or not. They need to understand that their behavior influences youth a great deal. Parents also need to teach children the difference between respecting and idolizing an individual for his / her athletic ability. Athletes like Charles Barkley beg not to be a role model.
He understands that children may view the grandiosity of fame as a ticket to do as they please. Athletes are engaging in more criminal behavior off the field and more violence and aggression on the field. Fred Each, the president of the National Alliance for Youth Sports, feels that poor role models in professional sports are making child athletes more aggressive and violent. 80 % of student athletes felt that intimidation is acceptable in a game. There is report after report of students injuring one another in practice and in games.
This introduction of increasing violence in an already questionable structure of youth sports adds even more questions and doubt to critics. The controversies involved in the effects of sports on youth are very important due to the ever-expanding number of participants and programs. It is also important because sports programs are used in community and government projects to deter bad behavior and protect at risk youth. Over three hundred studies have been reviewed that suggest participation in sp...
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Research essay sample on Professional Athletes Youth Sports
