Sports Participation

Internet addiction among adolescents has become a major social problem. Thus, more effective Internet addiction treatment programs through sports are required. This study tried to identify the relationship among sports participation, self-control, and Internet addiction among Korean adolescents. In total, 345 students (aged 15e18 years) from two middle schools and two high schools in South Korea were analyzed using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). SEM indicated a significant effect of sports participation on Internet addiction mediated by self-control. The results suggest the effectiveness of and need for sport and physical activity in Internet addiction treatment programs and for other addictions as well. Moreover, sports participation has a wider variety of psychological and physical benefits unlike intervention strategies or pharmacological treatments. Thus, the adoption of sports needs to be broadened from physical development to treating diverse psychological problems among adolescents.

In the last decades, parkour as a urban bodily practice has gained an extraordinary visibility in the global sportscape, thanks to its precocious mediatization in blockbuster movies and documentaries, in internet video channels like Youtube, in websites and in social networks (Gilchrist and Wheaton 2011, 2012; Stapleton, Terrio 2010). In Italy too, it has rapidly become popular among young people. In the chapter we will examine the role of UISP – Unione Italiana Sport per Tutti (Sport for All Italian Union), the largest Italian sport-for-all organisation, in the diffusion and legitimation of parkour within the Italian context, which also becomes a way for UISP to legitimise itself as the hegemonic promoter of new/alternative sports in Italy (Ferrero Camoletto, Sterchele and Genova 2015). UISP managed to incorporate into its organisation a large portion of the parkour scene: in 2013 about 70 parkour groups and 1,400 traceurs were formally affiliated, including some of the most active parkour groups in the national landscape. Despite its seemingly niche dimension, parkour has undergone a fast development within UISP when compared to other lifestyle practices, crossing the symbolic threshold of one thousand members in only two years (whilst for instance it took six years for skateboarding memberships to grow beyond that number). In reconstructing the stages of the (partial and still on-going) co-optation and incorporation of parkour within UISP (Thorpe, Wheaton 2011; Coates, Clayton, Humberstone 2010; Dumas, Laforest 2008), we will in particular focus on the project known as “Spazio Indysciplinati” (Undisciplined Space): the name of this project refers to the challenging character of the practices involved as well as to the difficulties to fit them into any existing Discipline-Leagues in which UISP is structured. Through workshops in 2010 and 2011 aimed at creating a think-tank of leaders of sport associations, simple sport practitioners and young people, the project first identified the new actors, spaces, sensibilities and trends in sports, bodily expression and movement. By intersecting other UISP projects including various street activities (juggling, parkour, street theatre, capoeira, skateboarding), Spazio Indysciplinati progressively emerged as a cultural and organisational space as open and fluid as the kind of sport and bodily activities covered. In 2013, the platform gave birth to the educational project Percorsi Indysciplinati (Undisciplined Paths), funded by a law on Social Promotion and aimed at attracting young people to physical activity. New and potentially low-threshold activities were expected to contrast inactive lifestyles offering opportunities for social participation and integration. Spazio Indysciplinati as a general frame and Percorsi Indysciplinati as a specific project had been monitored by the research group using a mix of qualitative tools like: interviews, focus groups, documentary and social network analysis. By analysing them with a specific focus on parkour, we will show how the fluid and unstructured nature of lifestyle sports (Eichberg 2010) contributes to unveiling and problematising the rigidity of the organisational logics (Slack 1997; Chelladurai 2001) that characterise even an innovative organization like UISP, opening up an arena for the definition of its cultural politics (Wheaton 2013) in relation to youth participation, uses of urban space (Borgogni 2012), social inclusion and community-building effects (Bavinton 2007; Lebreton 2010; Kidder 2012; De Martini Ugolotti 2014).

Despite regular participation in sport providing numerous outcomes vital for a life of enhanced wellbeing and reduced risk of chronic ill health, trends in post-16 dropout persist.
The study sought to examine the process of decline in male students’ participation in football by identifying the perceived constraints influencing their (de)motivation and (dis)engagement in the sport.
A qualitative, inductive, explorative approach was taken; employing grounded theory methodology to conduct one-off in-depth semi-structured interviews with 6 (20-21 years) members of the aforementioned population.
Results: Lack of time, lack of social support, and changes in sporting preferences were identified as the major perceived constraints hindering subjects’ participation in football; with intrapersonal, interpersonal, and structural constraints being interrelated.

Adolescence is a crucial period for bone development, and exercise can enhance bone acquisition during this period of life. However, it is not known how the different loading sports practiced can affect bone acquisition in adolescent male athletes. Therefore, the purpose of the present study was to determine the 1-year longitudinal bone acquisition among adolescent males involved in osteogenic (football) and non-osteogenic (swimming and cycling) sports and to compare with active controls. A total of 116 adolescent males aged 12 to 14 years at baseline were followed for 1 year: 37 swimmers, 37 footballers, 28 cyclists, and 14 active controls. Bone mineral content (BMC) was assessed using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA); cross-sectional area (CSA), cross-sectional moment of inertia (CSMI), and section modulus (Z) at the femoral neck was assessed using hip structural analysis (HSA); and bone texture of the lumbar spine was assessed using trabecular bone score (TBS). Serum N-terminal propeptide of procollagen type I (PINP), isomer of the Carboxi-terminal telopeptide of type 1 collagen (CTX-I), total serum calcium, and 25 hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] were analyzed. Footballers had significantly higher adjusted BMC at the lumbar spine (7.0%) and femoral neck (5.0%) compared with cyclists, and significantly greater BMC at the lumbar spine (6.9%) compared with swimmers. Footballers presented significantly greater TBS (4.3%) compared with swimmers, and greater CSMI (10.2%), CSA (7.1%), Z (8.9%) and TBS (4.2%) compared with cyclists. No differences were noted between cyclists and swimmers, both groups had similar bone acquisition compared with controls. PINP was significantly higher in footballers and controls compared with cyclists and swimmers (3.3% to 6.0%), and 25(OH)D was significantly higher in footballers and cyclists compared with swimmers and controls (9.9% to 13.1%). These findings suggest that bone acquisition is higher in adolescent male footballers compared with swimmers and cyclists at the femoral neck and lumbar spine sites of the skeleton.

It is required to identify the factors affecting sport participation of targeted population to promote participation in sports. The aim of the study is to investigate the economic and socio-demographic factors that influence sport participation in Turkey. In the empirical analysis, we employ binary Logit and Probit models in order to detect determinants of sport participation. The study is expected to fill the gap regarding economic side of sport participation in Turkey. The main evidence obtained from the analysis is that income level, sports expenditure, membership, availability of free time, and working as tenured have significant effect on participation in sports.

In this chapter we show how, if managed effectively, participation in some sports can cultivate a deeper environmental identity and pro-environmental behaviors. However, we argue that traditional sport will only be able to contribute to the development of an enhanced environmental identity if fundamental characteristics are changed. In the end, this might prove impossible. Instead, we call for a focus on outdoor and adventure sport (OAS) as an appropriate medium for the development of a deeper environmental identity. To do this we invoke an ecological dynamics perspective on sport and sport participation with its focus on the individual–environment relationship as it provides a principled framework for managing and implementing sport participation and the creation of a deeper environmental identity. We use this model to show how OAS might be designed to enhance environmental identity and pro-environmental behaviors.
In this chapter, the word environment specifically relates to outdoor, natural landscapes, and the natural world as differentiated from urban, sterile, fixed, or manicured sport pitches and grounds. The argument presented is that sport participation that explicitly balances the relationship between the individual and the environment is more likely to result in the development of a deeper environmental identity. Further, sports that focus on the individual–environment relationship are also more likely to result in positive behaviors towards the environment such as lifelong sustainable practices. Specifically, we present OAS as ideal activities for facilitating an acceptance that humans are part of the environment, promoting the environment over the task, sponsoring respect for the environment, and cultivating a deeper environmental identity.