Practice Goals/Activities
Participation in sports activities is very popular among adolescents. In fact, the 2016 National Survey of Children’s Health showed that among 12- to 17-year-olds nationwide, 78.9 percent were involved in organized activities, including sports lessons or a sports team (Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative n.d.). However, there is no universally accepted definition of sport. One popular definition describes a sport as “a human activity capable of achieving a result requiring physical exertion and/or physical skill which, by its nature and organization is competitive and is generally accepted as being a sport” (Eime et al. 2013, 100). As such, sports may include team and individual activities; contact and noncontact activities; and activities that take place in and out of school. Examples include but are not limited to football, baseball, basketball, tennis, golf, soccer, swimming, and cheerleading. Although they rely less on the physical skills of the participant, activities such as horse racing and chess can also be included in this definition. Thus, while the specific activities included within this general construct may vary greatly from sport to sport, the two basic components of a sporting activity include 1) physical exertion and/or skill, and 2) an element of competition.
Practice Theory
There are several theories that underlie the idea of a relationship between adolescents’ participation in sports and juvenile delinquency. Hirschi’s social bond theory (1969) suggests that individuals with strong bonds to society are less likely to engage in criminal or delinquent acts, because they could jeopardize losing those bonds. According to four central elements of the theory, participating in sports can increase youth’s 1) attachment to significant others, such as their teammates and coaches; 2) commitment to conventional activities, which can help them refrain from delinquent acts so they will not jeopardize the chance to participate; 3) belief in society’s values, because similar rules, norms, and values are being practiced in sports; and 4) involvement in sports, which gives them less time to engage in delinquency (Spruit et al. 2016).
Routine activities theory (Cohen and Felson 1979), which assumes that crime and delinquency occur when there are opportunities, would also suggest that youth will not engage in delinquency because participating in sports would reduce their time and opportunities to engage in delinquent acts (Spruit et al. 2016).
Social-learning theory (Bandura 1977) asserts that behavior is learned through observing and imitating the behavior of others (Gardner, Roth, and Brooks-Gunn 2009). Thus, adolescents participating in sports could be influenced by the behaviors of their teammates (i.e., other adolescents) or by adults (i.e., coaches and other support staff).
