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Rose Colored Glasses
The Problem Areas
    Out Of Control Parents
    Child Exploitation
    Youth Sports Dropouts
    Endangering Young Athletes’ Health
    Sexual Abuse Of Young Athletes
    Youth Sports Violence
Meeting The Needs Of Kids And Adults

Youth Sports Dropouts

35% of the young athletes in a recent survey of 1,183 athletes aged eleven to eighteen planned to stop playing the next year. Nearly half of the parents of 418 athletes aged six to ten surveyed reported that their child was not interested in sport anymore. In a survey of 5,800 children who had recently stopped playing a sport, the top five reasons for stopping were:

• I lost interest

• I was not having fun

• It took too much time

• Coach was a poor teacher

• Too much pressure

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Asked what changes might get them involved in sports again, frequent responses included:

• "If practices were more fun"

• "If I could play more"

• "If coaches understood players better."

What these findings suggest is that the way our youth sports programs are organized and run fail to meet the needs of children.

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Endangering Young Athletes’ Health

Another indicator of the crisis in youth sports is the high incidence of such problems as eating disorders, injuries, use of performance enhancing drugs, and alcohol abuse.

• Eating Disorders: The number of athletes with eating disorders in some sports, such as wrestling, gymnastics, figure skating and diving is many times the usual rate in the general population. In one study of 695 male and female college athletes, 39% of the female athletes met the criteria for bulimia. The process is insidious. The longer young athletes remain involved in competitive programs, and the more pressure they are under to win, the greater the risk of such problems occurring.
  
  

• Injuries And Overtraining: An estimated four million children seek treatment for sports injuries in hospital emergency rooms each year. Twice that number sees a primary care physician. There has been a steady increase in the number of overuse injuries caused when adults push young athletes too hard or too far in training. These overuse injuries are all preventable
  
  

• Steroid Abuse: Children are not immune to the use of performance enhancing drugs. South African junior athlete Liza de Villiers was fourteen years old when she tested positive for anabolic steroid use in 1995 and banned from athletics for four years. In a recent survey of 965 students at four Massachusetts middle schools, researchers found that 2.7 percent of the youngsters were using steroids. This means that children as young as eleven, in sixth grade, are using anabolic steroids to change their appearance and performance. It is impossible for children in this age to be obtaining such substances without the assistance of adults. It is hard to imagine the pressures being placed on children who begin these dangerous practices at such a young age. It suggests to me that the crisis we are facing is getting worse, not improving.
  
  

• Alcohol abuse: The statistics on alcohol abuse among student athletes are alarming. In one study intercollegiate athletes were found to have the highest rates of binge drinking of any group of students. In another study, male high school student athletes in a middle class community were found to have rates of alcohol use than other students. (There were no differences between female athletes and non-athletes). Many sports have a long tradition of promoting alcohol consumption on a social basis (such as keg parties).

These serious health problems would be cause for concern even if they affected only older, more committed athletes. But when we see evidence that these problems are filtering down to children in high school and even middle school, we should be deeply concerned. No trophy or medal or national championship is worth destroying the health of even one child.

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Article Updated: August 25, 2007

When Is Your Child Old Enough for You to Get Involved in Youth Sports?
Five Ways For Sport Parents To Set A Good Example
Escaping The Parent Trap
Successful Development Of the Young Athlete: Guidelines For Parents
Youth Sports Motivation Questionnaire (Parents Version)
Youth Sports Motivation Questionnaire (Youth Athlete Version)

Rethinking Youth Sports: The MomsTeam Approach
Pulling A Child Off A Sports Team For Poor Grades Sends The Wrong Message
Abuse, Harassment, And Neglect: The Pain Of Emotional Injuries
Does Your Child's Program Use The "Games Based Approach" To Teaching Sports?
Equal Playing Time: Should It Be The Rule, Not The Exception?

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