Alex Reed

What effects do
organized sports have
on youth
development?
Price-Mitchell, M., PhD (2012, January
8). The Psychology of Youth Sports.
Like the title suggests, PriceMitchell spends most of the article
focusing on the psychological
elements of youth sports. She
quickly addresses what I believe to
be a key point in the youth sports
debate which is how some people
view it as nothing but beneficial and
how others have nothing but
negativity about its effect on kids.
She states The truth is that neither
portrait of youth sports is completely
correct. Research studies have been
conducted with hundreds of
thousands of children who participate
in sports. Generally, these studies
show that youth who participate in
organized sports during middle and
high school do better academically
and are offered greater job prospects
than children who do not partake in
sports activities. However, nuances
exist in these studies that are
important for parents to understand.
Like all studies that equate youth
activities with success in life, it is
imperative to look deeper to learn
how these findings apply to your own
children. (Price-Mitchell, 2012). She

Lawrence, C. (2014, February 14). The

Impact of Sports in Young Children.
In this article, Lawrence references
the American Academy of Pediatrics
and KidsHealth to explain some
benefits and drawbacks of organized
youth sports. She talks about how
sports can add structure to their
schedules and improve their physical
health by taking part in physical
activities. She also hits on the social
aspect of team sports saying For
young children who may still be very
egocentric, participating in team sports
teaches them to think about the group
as a whole and encourages them to be
happy for the success of their
teammates. (Lawrence, 2014). Also it
is mentioned that it helps with
relationship building between players
and coaches which will help them later I
life. Stress and increased commitment
are also a matter to think about,
however. In sport situations, she says
many children involved in organized
sports feel pressured to succeed. While
a little stress can be beneficial because
it can heighten alertness and lead
children to perform with increased

O'Sullivan, John. "The Detrimental Effect of Early Sport

Specialization | Changing the Game Project." Changing the Game
Project. Changing the Game Project, 2015. Web.
This article shows a different point of view than the others. It
talks about kids who specialize in one particular sport and the
effects it has on the children. The greatest difference between
our childrens sporting experience and our own is the rise of year
round, sport specific organizations that ask even require
season after season of participation in order to stay in the player
development pipeline. The pressure to have your child specialize
in a single sport at a young age has never been stronger.
(OSullivan 2015) Whenever I played sport, I loved it. I played a
variety of them and did not feel pressured as I knew some of my
peers were. The parents of select kids feel like their kids will fall
behind if they do not stay in the program 24/7. OSullivan goes on
to say This fear has forced kids into sports that often are not of
their own choosing, and in many cases compels them to remain
in activities that are not enjoyable, not intrinsically motivating,
nor are congruent with their actual athletic abilities. This path
fails to consider many of the physical, emotional and social costs
"Understanding Child Development In Sports and Competition." Winning Edge
Sports Psychology. Winning Edge Sports Psychology LLC, 2012.
Winning Edge Sports Psychology is a company that specializes in what my topic is
all about. In this article what they have done is divide the kids into categories
(Young kids, adolescent, and pre-adolescent) and list what challenges they face on
the field and the best way to handle them. Pre-adolescents (ages 10-13 years)
face the social challenges of developing best friends and gaining acceptance from
peers. Social relationships are one of the developmental milestones that this age
group is navigating. They want to be part of a group and often fear being
embarrassed. Developing a same sex best friend (s) is a major task of this social
stage. Pre-teens tend to be loyal to their friends and make many decisions based
upon maintaining their friendships (Winning Edge Sports Psychology LLC, 2012)
They also hit on what motivates kids to play sports in the first place. Regardless
of an athlete's age, there are several common themes that relate to participation
in sport. A study completed by USA Swimming (1998-99) asked swimmers from
age 7 to young adulthood why they swam, and how they defined fun. The results
of the study supply important information about athlete's motivation for
participation in sport. The swimmers rated the following four reasons as their
motivation for swimming: #1 To have fun. #2 For fitness. #3 Being with friends.

Felfe, C., Lechner, M., & Steinmayr, A. (2011, November 4). Does sport make your
kids smarter? New evidence from Germany
The writers of this article are economic professors and econometric chairs in
Munich, Germany. Their focus in this article is measuring the effect of sports
during childhood. They did this by running an empirical analysis that draws upon
a cross-sectional (medical) survey (Lechner, 2011). It is called KiGGS. They go on
to better describe it by saying, This dataset provides us not only with a wide array
of children's cognitive and non-cognitive skill measures, but also with detailed
information on children's health, sport participation, and their family background
(5,632 children). Our main empirical approach is based on a matching estimation
strategy. The basic idea is that we compare the outcomes of children who
participate in sport with children who do not participate but are almost identical in
other aspects, such as sex and age, their parents education and income, their
brothers and sisters, their parents parenting style, or the characteristics of the
neighborhood they live in. (Felfe, 2011) The results they found showed positive
effects of sports on kids cognitive and non-cognitive abilities. They support their
findings with this data; We normalise our measures of children's skills to be zero
on average and have a standard deviation of one. In so doing we can interpret the
size of the effects in relationship to the general variation in children's skills
(measured by one standard deviation (henceforth, sd). Both cognitive skills,
measured by overall school grades, and overall non-cognitive skills improve by
0.13 sd. The latter effect is mainly driven by a reduction in emotional problems
Paula, Elle. "Psychological Effects of Sports on Children and
Youth." LIVESTRONG.COM. LIVESTRONG.COM, 14 Aug.
2015.
Elle Paula has a certificate in holistic nutrition as well as a
Bachelor of Science degree from Framingham State
College. Her article hits on the basics as it highlights how
the data shows how the participation in sports as an
adolescence helps increase both emotional and
behavioral well-being leading to higher self-esteem and
confidence, which results in better overall performance.
(Paula, 2015). She goes on explaining the good that comes
from working together as a team to accomplish a common
goal, elaborating that it builds strong peer relationships and
increases childrens social support. She also focuses a lot
of her attention on potential drawbacks, saying it is not all
rainbows. If the pressure to win is overemphasized or the

Dr. Holt, Nick. "Can Sport Help Develop Life Skills?"

Http://www.wise-qatar.org. N.p., 2014. Web.
Dr. Nick Holt has a very interesting take on the subject.
He does, like the rest, spend time talking about the basics
skills that team sports could possibly help flourish, but he
makes a staggering point that many others skip over or do
not address. In a simple statement, bringing up a youth
researchers quote, life skills are taught, not caught, it
shifts the attention to the massive role the coaches and
parents have over the type of experience the child has
playing these sports. He goes on to say So how can sport
produce both positive and negative outcomes? It is
because the outcomes of sport are contingent on the ways
in which sport is delivered by parents and coaches and
experienced by children. Different types of delivery and
experiences will lead to different types of outcomes.
Positive outcomes, such as life skills, must be directly
taught to young athletes. They do not naturally occur just
by playing a sport. (Holt, 2014) When I read this, I
immediately sat back and thought about it. It makes
perfect sense. So many articles are either about how
sports cause either negativity or positivity. Everyone is so
caught up in relating it to their past experiences that they
Harris MD MPH, Sally S. "Physical Activity, Sports and the Prepubescent Child."
Physical Activity, Sports and the Pre-pubescent Child. Palo Alto Medical
Foundation, Dec. 2005. Web
Sally S. Harris writes along the same lines as Dr. Holt. She states that when
parents ask what the best exercises and sports for kids are she tells them there is
not one. That it is not a matter of a type of sport, but that all physical activity is
important paired with the special ingredient which is encouragement. Again we
see the link that takes us back to what really shapes the overall takeaway that
kids have from participating in sports. The effect that the coach and parent have
on the kid. She then focuses on how much time is being spent on sports and talks
about how, like all things, too much can have various consequences. Sometimes
parents are concerned that their child's participation on a team that has hour-long
daily practices, and several hours of games on weekends may put the child at risk
for overuse injuries. (Harris, 2005) Overuse injuries can be prevented by
curtailing the activity associated with pain. The philosophy of "no pain, no
gain" is not appropriate for children. Fortunately, most injuries in this age