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Sport's place in the development of adolescent morality is an issue that has cycled through the halls of academia for years without clear agreement. Informing a theoretical base with positive youth development and achievement goal theory, the purpose of this research was to expand the debate through examination of the relationship between ability level, achievement motivation orientations, and the morality-based outcomes of character and caring in the context of a competitive team sport. Participants in the research were 230 male adolescents attending an intercollegiate skills camp for American football at a large southeastern university in the United States. Subjects completed a web-based questionnaire at camp registration. Significant findings included a relationship between participants who self-reported high ability level exhibiting a higher degree of character than participants with lower ability level. Further, an interaction effect was found between ability level and certain orthogonal achievement goal orientations on the measure of character Limitations of the study are discussed in light of improving future research on the subject area. This examination of the relationship between an emerging theoretical framework in positive youth development and achievement goal theory provides an important step towards development of an applied and conceptual model for positive youth development through organized sport., The study of sport participation as a mechanism for positive development of youth and adolescents has centered upon the age-old debate over whether sport builds or reveals character. Examinations of [...]

Although many adolescents participate in sports and other types of organized activities, little extant research explores how youth development outcomes may vary for youth involved in different combinations of activities. The present study uses the Child Development Supplement of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, a large, nationally representative sample, to compare activity patterns of adolescents ages 10-18 years (n = 1,711). A cluster analytic technique revealed 5 activity clusters: sports-focused, sports plus other activities, primarily school-based activities, primarily religious youth groups, and low activity involvement. Activity patterns were examined in conjunction with 5 categories of youth development outcomes, including competence (e.g., academic ability), confidence (e.g., self-concept of ability), connections (e.g., talking with friends), character (e.g., externalizing behavior problems), and caring (e.g., prosocial behavior). Results showed that those who participated only in sports had more positive outcomes compared with those who had little or no involvement in organized activities, but less positive outcomes compared with those who participated in sports plus other activities. Keywords: positive youth development, after-school activities, cluster analysis

The authors used data from Grades 5 through 7 of the longitudinal 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development to assess relations among sports participation, other out-of-school-time (OST) activities, and indicators of youth development. They used a mixture of variable-and pattern-centered analyses aimed at disentangling different features of participation (i.e., intensity, breadth). The benefits of sports participation were found to depend, in part, on specific combinations of multiple activities in which youths participated along with sports. In particular, participation in a combination of sports and youth development programs was related to positive youth development and youth contribution, even after controlling for the total time youths spent in OST activities and their sports participation duration. Adolescents' total time spent participating in OST activities, duration of participation in sports, and activity participation pattern each explained a unique part of the variance in some of the indicators of youth functioning. These findings suggest the need for future research to simultaneously assess multiple indices of OST activity participation. Keywords: extracurricular activities, adolescence, sports, positive development, pattern-centered approaches

In a study of 1,344 urban adolescents, the authors examined the relation between participation in organized sports and juvenile delinquency. They compared youth who participated in sports to those who only participated in nonathletic activities and to those who did not participate in any organized activities. They also examined the indirect relations between sports and delinquency via 2 peer-related constructs--deviant peer affiliations and unstructured socializing. Finally, they examined the extent to which gender and prior externalizing problems moderated the direct and indirect relations between sports participation and delinquency. The authors found that the odds of nonviolent delinquency were higher among boys who participated in sports when compared to boys who participated only in nonathletic activities but not when compared to boys who did not participate in any organized activities. Deviant peer affiliations and unstructured socializing mediated the relation between sports participation and boys' nonviolent delinquency. Moreover, prior externalizing problems moderated the mediated path through peer deviance. The authors did not, however, find direct, mediated, or moderated relations between sports and boys' violent delinquency nor between sports and girls' violent or nonviolent delinquency. Keywords: adolescence, sports, extracurricular activities, peers, delinquency

Understanding what factors influence positive youth development has been advocated by youth development researchers (P. L. Benson, 2006; J. S. Eccles & J. A. Gootman, 2002). Consequently, the purpose of this study was to examine whether perceptions of a caring youth sport context influenced prosocial and antisocial behavior through efficacy-related beliefs, that is, positive and negative affective self-regulatory efficacy (ASRE) and empathic self-efficacy (ESE). Multiethnic youths taking part in summer sport programs (N = 395) completed a questionnaire that measured perceptions of the caring climate, ESE, ASRE, and social behavior. Structural equation modeling was used to test whether ASRE and ESE mediated the relationship between caring and social behaviors. Findings revealed that perceptions of caring positively predicted ASRE and ESE. In turn, positive ASRE positively predicted ESE. Prosocial behaviors were positively linked to ESE, whereas antisocial behaviors were negatively predicted by positive ASRE. The results suggest that caring influences prosocial and antisocial behavior because such contexts develop youths' ability to monitor, manage, and control positive affect, which in turn enhances their belief in their ability to empathize. Keywords: caring, positive youth development, empathy, emotion regulation, efficacy

Byline: Leanne C. Findlay (1), Anne Bowker (1) Keywords: Self-esteem; Self-concept; Sport; Sport orientation; Gender Abstract: The current study explored specific aspects of sports and individuals on 4 domains of the self-system (physical competence and physical appearance self-concept, global physical and general self-esteem). Participants were 351 adolescents (M .sub.age = 13.45, SD = 1.25 years, males n = 132) recruited from elite sports and regular school classrooms. Participants were separated into groups based on sports participation (elite athletes, n = 171, competitive athletes, n = 71 and non-athletes, n = 145). The intensity of the activity (strenuous, moderate, and mild), the level of athleticism (competitive, elite, non-athlete), gender, and sport orientation (win, goal, competitive) were examined. The level of athleticism (elite, competitive, and non-athlete) was found to be positively related to physical competence and appearance self-concept as well as global physical and general self-esteem. Analyses revealed a significant difference between the non-athletes and both the competitive and elite groups (with a difference between the latter two for physical competence only). Sport orientation was found to moderate the relation between athleticism and general self-esteem non-athletes who had a greater win orientation or lower competitive orientation were also lower in self-esteem. Thus, the fit between the level of competition and self-concept may depend on characteristics of the individual such as her/her sport orientation. Author Affiliation: (1) Department of Psychology, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada Article History: Registration Date: 22/10/2007 Received Date: 03/07/2007 Accepted Date: 22/10/2007 Online Date: 14/11/2007

Experience alters behavior by producing enduring changes in the neural processes that support performance. For example, performing a specific action improves the execution of that action via changes in associated sensory and motor neural circuitry, and experience using language improves language comprehension by altering the anatomy and physiology of perisylvian neocortical brain regions. Here we provide evidence that specialized (sports) motor experience enhances action-related language understanding by recruitment of left dorsal lateral premotor cortex, a region normally devoted to higher-level action selection and implementation-even when there is no intention to perform a real action. Experience playing and watching sports has enduring effects on language understanding by changing the neural networks that subserve comprehension to incorporate areas active in performing sports skills. Without such experience, sport novices recruit lower-level sensory-motor regions, thought to support the instantiation of movement, during language processing, and activity in primary motor areas does not help comprehension. Thus, the language system is sufficiently plastic and dynamic to encompass expertise-related neural recruitment outside core language networks. expertise | premotor | action planning | motor stimulation | comprehension

Social stereotypes such as race, class, religion, physical characteristics, and gender affect participation in sport and physical activities. However, the degree to which individuals are sensitive to the stigmas that [...]

This multi-site experiment evaluated the effects of pre-competition positive imagery and self-instructions on serving accuracy in a tennis serving competition. One hundred and fifteen adult tennis players were randomly assigned [...]

The present investigation examined relationships between pre-competition anxiety, goal-performance discrepancies, and athletes'negative self-talk while performing. Two studies were conducted with athletes who took part in middle-distance cross-country events. The first [...]

The purpose of this study was to investigate potential differences in the levels of reported sport commitment model variables on the basis of participation outlet and skill level, thereby allowing [...]