Describe the pros and cons of participation in organized youth sports during childhood

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

For most children, joining community athletic teams is associated with increased self-esteem and social skills. Among shy children, sports participation seems to play a protective role, fostering self-confidence and a decline in social anxiety, perhaps because it provides a sense of group belonging and a basis for communicating with peers. Also, children who view themselves as good at sports are more likely to continue playing on teams in adolescence, which predicts greater participation in sports and other physical fitness activities in early adulthood. When parents and coaches emphasize effort, improvement, participation, and teamwork, young athletes enjoy sports more, exert greater effort to improve their skills, and perceive themselves as more competent at their chosen sport. This positive emphasis helps promote physical activity. In some cases, though, youth sports overemphasize competition and substitute adult control for children's natural experimentation with rules and strategies. Children who join teams so early that the necessary skills are beyond their abilities soon lose interest. Coaches and parents who criticize rather than encourage can prompt intense anxiety in some children. Rather than promoting elite performance, high parental pressure to excel at sports and frequent, intense practice are linked to children's emotional difficulties and early athletic dropout. Further, frequent, intense practice in any sport can lead to painful "overuse" injuries and, in extreme cases, to stress-related fractures resulting in premature closure of the epiphyses of the long bones.