Parenting in relation to children’s sports participation: generational changes and potential implications

Abstract

This paper presents data on the parenting practices and perceptions of middle-class parents in the domain of children’s sport. Adopting a grounded-theory approach, the data were generated through 16 semi-structured interviews conducted with parents and children from eight different families. The findings in relation to parenting practices indicated that the parents were ‘investing’ in their children’s sports participation earlier and more heavily than their parents had done with them, thus suggesting an intensification in the middle-class social reproduction process. The findings regarding parenting perceptions revealed that the parents felt they were better able and more inclined to invest in their children in general, and their children’s sports participation in particular, as a consequence of several ‘structural’ and ‘cultural’ changes that have occurred over the past 30 years or so. Given recent research indicating the significance of socialisation in the family for sports participation rates (Birchwood, Roberts, & Pollock, 2008), this additional investment by parents may have profound implications. Indeed, if sports participation rates are strongly dependent upon the transmission of sporting cultures within families, and parents are increasingly enabled and inclined to invest the sporting cultivation of their offspring, it follows that overall sports participation rates will benefit. This may be a more or less significant part of the explanation for the substantial growth in sports participation from the 1970s.

本文收集了中产阶级父母在孩子的运动项目上的实践和参与的数据。采用扎根理论, 通过进行16半结构化访谈, 从来自八个不同的家庭的家长和孩子那里收集数据。调查结果显示, 在早期与直接参与体育相比, 父母更多的'投资'孩子的体育运动, 这显示了中产阶级家庭社会再生产的剧烈性。关于观念调查结果显示, 一般情况下中产阶级父母更有能力和倾向于给子女投资和促进他们的孩子对于体育运动的参与。作为在过去30年左右几个已经发生过的“结构性”和“文化”的变化的后果, 鉴于最近的研究表明在家庭中对体育参与率中社会化的意义 (宝桦台, 罗伯茨, ＆波洛克, 2008年), 家长的这种额外投资可能产生深远的影响。事实上, 如果体育参与率强烈地依赖于家庭中的体育文化的传播, 家长会越来越能够并倾向于投资自己后代的体育运动, 从而直接增加体育参与率。这可能是对20世纪70年代一来体育运动参与率大幅增长的一部分解释。

Este trabalho apresenta dados sobre a prática de criação e percepção de pais de classe média no domínio dos esportes infantis. Adotando uma abordagem de teoria fundamentada nos dados (grounded theory), os dados foram gerados através de 16 entrevistas semiestruturadas conduzidas com pais e filhos de oito famílias distintas. Os achados em relação às práticas de criação dos pais indicaram que estes “investiam” na participação em esportes infantis mais cedo e mais intensamente do que seus pais haviam feito com eles, sugerindo assim uma intensificação no processo de reprodução social de classe média. Os achados referentes às percepções de pais revelaram que eles sentiam que eram mais capazes e mais inclinados a investir em seus filhos em geral, e na sua participação em esportes infantis em particular, como consequência de diversas mudanças “estruturais” e “culturais” que ocorreram ao longo dos últimos 30 anos, aproximadamente. Dada a recente pesquisa indicando a significância da socialização na família para índices de participação em esportes (Birchwood, Roberts, & Pollock, 2008), esse investimento adicional por parte dos pais pode ter implicações profundas. De fato, se os índices de participação no esporte dependem fortemente da transmissão de culturas esportivas em famílias, e os pais estão cada vez mais capacitados e inclinados a investir no cultivo do esporte em seus filhos, significaria que os índices de participação geral em esportes seriam beneficiados. Essa pode ser uma parte mais ou menos significante da explicação para o crescimento substancial na participação em esportes desde a década de 1970.

Keywords:

• capital
• culture
• habitus
• investment
• parents
• sport

关键词:

• 资产
• 文化
• 习惯
• 投资
• 父母
• 运动

Palavras Chaves:

• capital
• cultura
• habitus
• investimento
• pais
• esporte

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their comments on the original version of this paper.

Notes

1. ^‘Differences/inequalities' is used in view of the fact that while in most of the literature, social stratification is discussed in terms of ‘inequality', we may actually be dealing with ‘differences' that have developed historically in socially stratified contexts (Roberts, 2009), or at least a combination of the two.

2. We are grateful to one of the reviewers for encouraging us to make this point.

3. The degree to which habitus actually combines ‘agency' and ‘structure' has been subject to much debate. Space does not permit a discussion of the debate here, but papers by Nash (1999, 2003) provide useful overviews.

4. In this regard, some might speculate whether, despite the fact that men aspire to do more with their children and actually spend more time with them in practice, this relative under-representation of fathers in the interviews constitutes further evidence that they are not in fact making a substantially increased contribution to domestic duties (Chambers, 2012).

5. In this paper, we will use the term ‘generation' in its everyday sense to refer to those of roughly the same age group who occupy specific positions within family groups, such as parents and children.

6. As Roberts (2009) has noted, sociologists are generally in agreement that classes tend to have an ‘economic base', and that class position tends to rest on how one earns a living.

7. The criteria provided to the teachers on which they judged their pupils were in accordance with the Sport England (2003) definition of sporty: individuals who enjoyed sport and had high participation levels.

8. It is worth acknowledging that the inevitable parent–child power relations may, in some way, have impacted upon the interview process where the children were concerned, especially given the relatively formal nature of the interviews themselves.