Project 2
Sam Goldberg
Professor Brandi Bradley
ENC 2135
9 March 2017
Project #2
Since the beginning of modern sports, kids have always idolized and looked up to professional athletes in many ways. Popular culture and the media, such as ESPN news, Twitter, and Sports Center, have created views and ideas about how athletes should conduct themselves. Kids take some of these preconceived ideas from what they see on TV and on social networks of how athletes play sports, behave themselves, and even how athletes train, out of context and try to apply them to their own lives. This relationship between pop culture’s view on sports and how kids view and play them is evident in a lot of today’s societal norms, due to how many youth athletes try to model themselves after what they see the pros doing on TV or online. This relationship can be beneficial to kids in many ways, but it can also be just as detrimental. The effect of this relationship can result in either long-term success, as it can motivate young athletes to work harder, or it can result in instant failure. Often the pressure to conform to popular culture distracts kids from playing the actual sport they enjoy, and sometimes effect their future. There are also some kids who use the pop culture and media influences to motivate them in sports and in their life.
Injuries are one of the main things that have plagued the wide world of youth sports, especially in recent years. Sports injuries are defined as an injury that results in a player to miss practice or playing time. The high amount of sports injuries that occur today, necessitates that injured athletes receive the proper treatment and rehabilitation (Massey, 2014). Injured young athletes are heavily influenced by the competitive culture of today’s sports during their rehabilitation. Kids tend to feel pressure from pop culture, their teammates, coaches, and even sometimes their parents to recover and get back into playing form. In an interview with an athletic trainer from Florida State University in 2017 it was said that “when young athletes are injured, a lot of the pressure to get healthy again comes from the parents or coaches of the player.” This social pressure can cause young athletes to make risky decisions that oppose medical logic. A study from The Journal of Athletic Training, done in 2014, examined the mindset of athletes that were rehabilitating from a sports injury. The results of the study show that the injured athletes had an overwhelming focus on their physical state rather than their mental state or their future (Massey,2014). This risky mindset causes young athletes to ignore the consequences that an insufficient recovery may have on their immediate and long-term future, physical, and mental health. On the other hand, some young athletes, who are either more concerned about their future or are positively influenced by parents or coaches, make sure they take the proper steps to recovery.
In addition to the cause of health implications on the youth, pop culture and the media also heavily influence the ethics and motivation of youth sports. Youth sports are more competitive than they have ever been, and they get more and more competitive each year. The ultra-competitive culture of youth sports is heavily influenced by some characteristics of professional sports. Youth sports has evolved from a fun and easy way for kids to get exercise in a social environment, to a competitive culture, where athletes are motivated by being the best and as a measure of their own personal success. The result of this is the decline of ethics in youth sports, and the change of mindset from fun and leisure to hard work and competition. Youth sports are more focused on winning and success, rather than just having fun and getting exercise. In a study done by ABC news, the majority of 10 to 12-year-old kids that were interviewed said that it was “never ok to be bad at a sport.” (Ziemer, 2000).
Young athletes are now motivated by more materialistic goals than ever, rather than by the love of the sport. A study by The European Journal of Physical Education and Sport, which measured the ethical code of athletes, shows how the poor ethics of athletes create an ethically-poor culture for youth sports (Andrius, 2013). The article also states that poor ethics is a blight on youth sports that can only be solved by the positive reinforcement of parents, and other groups of authorities. In an interview in 2017 with the same athletic trainer from Florida State University, it was said that most professional athletes today are contributing to better ethics in youth sports, because “no athlete just plays for the money, a lot of athletes grew up with nothing but a love for the game.”
One of the most common things in youth sports that causes athletes to stop playing is burning out. Burning out of a sport is when an athlete, who enjoys playing a certain sport, puts in so much hard work that they lose their motivation to play and forget about the love they once had for their sport. In an interview in 2017 with a Florida State University athletic trainer, the trainer stated that it is common for young athletes to burn out. She also said that “The cause of burnouts in young athletes is trying to take things too fast.” The media portrays athletes as always working hard and putting hours upon hours into perfecting their craft. While this can definitely inspire young athletes to work hard and be the best they can be, it can also be argued that this can cause kids to over-work themselves. The FSU athletic trainer stated that it is important for young athletes to not specialize in one sport, in order to avoid burnout. The view of professionalism in sports is admired by so many young athletes, but often times this view causes young athletes to lose sight of why they really enjoy playing a sport, and view their sport as hard work more than fun.
The social media presence of professional athletes also glorifies having lots of money and material things, such as nice cars. One example of this is on the Instagram account of MMA fighter, Conor McGregor, which distracts young athletes (Andrews, 2001). Some may argue that the increased competitiveness and focus on success is beneficial to youth sports, as it helps promote athletic growth. There are some who also believe that this success-driven culture helps produce the best athletes and improve the integrity of young athletes. An experiment was conducted by Physical Education & Sport Pedagogy in 2008, in which high school athletes were interviewed about the most important traits for an athlete to have. The results showed that the majority of the athletes that were interviewed said that character and sportsmanship are the most important traits that an athlete should have.
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The environment of youth sports creates a place for cheating, such as doping. A study by The Journal of Addictive Diseases in 2008 shows the close relation between performance enhancing drug use in the pros, and doping and performance enhancing drug use in youth sports. This article suggests that youth athletes are influenced by pros and pop culture to have a certain image, which leads them to using performance enhancing drugs or to doping (Martin, 2008).
Professional athletes have a truly amazing amount of power to influence youth sports. Whether it’s on TV or social media, professional athletes influence a huge number of people. More often than not, athletes are judged based on their accomplishments. This idea of perfectionism in pro sports rubs off on youth sports. This extreme focus on goal attainment in youth sports not only effects the motivation of athletes, but also their life satisfaction when they are playing sports. Patrick Gaudreau, in his article “Athletes’ Broad Dimensions of Dispositional Perfectionism: Examining Changes in Life Satisfaction and the Mediating Role of Sport-Related Motivation and Coping,” explains that the social importance of success in sports can create anxiety in young athletes. However, perfectionism has also been argued to be a good thing. In an article by Jack Perconte, he argues that perfectionism can teach athletes to set goals and reach those goals. Perconte states that sports should mature the athletes during competition, and in life in general, helping them to grow and teach them life lessons. During an interview with a Florida State University athletic trainer, the trainer stated that perfectionism greatly effects the lives of young athletes and that “perfectionism is never a good thing, because it is unrealistic,” and they will never be able to achieve perfection.
The media and pop culture yield an enormous amount of power in influencing how the world’s young athletes think and behave. In today’s technology-based society, that influence is magnified by how easily young athletes can access information from media outlets such as social media, television, and radio. These outlets let them observe how pro athletes think and behave, giving them a sort of standard for their lives. It is truly dependent on the kid whether he or she uses the media and pop culture to motivate them and guide them in a positive way, rather than let them distract him or her. Realistically, the ideas and perceptions of the media and pop culture are irrelevant with the proper guidance of parent or guardian, whom should serve as positive role models, because they have the greatest influence on young athletes and their lives. The ethical principles of a developing athlete and child should motivate and guide them to be successful.
Project 2 Reflection
Honestly, I imagined project two being easier than it really was. I had a difficult time deciding on a topic that I felt passionate about. It was also more challenging because rather than writing about a topic, we had to write about a research question. I decided to write about how pop culture influences youth sports. I chose this topic because I am very interested in sports, and their place in society. I never really had trouble locating information on my topic, but the information I found was not always useful information. Through this project, I became way more comfortable finding credible peer reviewed sources. I also became more familiar with the APA citation style, which I had never used before. I got a lot of my sources through the FSU library. Through my research, I learned a lot about how the world of youth sports is influenced by pop culture, more specifically, professional sports. I was unaware at how greatly the media effects youth sports, and the future of sports in our country The work I did and the skills I learned while working on this project will stay with me, and will be useful for research assignments in the future.