Parents in the parasport pathway: Parental experiences of facilitating their child’s engagement in competitive disability sport

Abstract

Research examining the role of parenting in mainstream sporting environments is well developed but little attention has been focused upon parents of young athletes with disabilities. Parents are often a silent workforce in enabling the engagement of young people in competitive sport. In the case of young athletes with parasport aspirations, parenting brings with it added complexity, both practically and psychologically. Thus, it is necessary to understand the experiences of these parents so appropriate support mechanisms can be developed. As a result, this research asked, “what are parents experiences of supporting their disabled child through their parasport journeys?” Using in-depth reflexive thematic analysis underpinned by phenomenology, interviews with eleven parents of elite youth para-athletes who were based in the United Kingdom were carried out.

Our analysis indicated parents of young para-athletes share values relating to equality and inclusion, and that social exclusion in mainstream education environments directed these young people toward sport. Parents discussed the complex and multifarious roles they undertook to support their child’s sport engagement, indicating several challenges including limited local disability-specific sport opportunity and funding difficulties. They also highlighted key benefits for the child (e.g., “fitting in,” social belonging and independence) as well as for them (e.g., parental support, worrying less). Findings are discussed in relation to existing literature, and key recommendations in relation to policy and practice are made.

Lay summary: Eleven parents of disabled young athletes were interviewed about their experiences of supporting their child in their parasport journeys. Parents discussed their dissatisfaction with mainstream physical education and school sport and their concerns about their child’s social belonging. Sport was seen as a route toward supporting social inclusion but engaging in youth sport as a parent of a disabled child brought challenges and benefits.

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

• The wider cultural, societal and environmental barriers to sport engagement for disabled youth, and the meaningfulness of social interactions within youth parasport should be considered when developing theoretical models to understand youth sport systems.

• It may be useful for youth sports programs at all levels to consult with parents of disabled athletes to develop appropriate mechanisms of support and education which reflect the complexity of the disability landscape.

• Schools and local community sports clubs should reconsider their offerings and develop more opportunities to engage disabled youth in sport, making access to information about these opportunities readily available to parents and young people.

• Talent identification pathways for disabled youth would benefit from better clarification and clearer signposting processes leading from community to elite sport.

Introduction

The role of parents in youth sport participation is well understood, with literature moving beyond simply exploring the practical support provided by parents toward the development of psychological models of support and parent educational programmes (Knight et al., 2017). However, researchers have failed to account for the experiences of parents with children who are involved in competitive parasport. This paper addresses this research gap by examining the experiences of these parents. This novel study intended to develop insight about this seldom-accessed population to determine mechanisms to better support parents of disabled young people to access sport opportunities for their children. It examines the intersection between parenting, disability and youth sport to highlight the distinctive challenges for parents of athletes who are part of parasport pathways. Within the field of disability sport research there is contention regarding the politics of language used to refer to people who experience disability (see Peers et al., 2014). In this paper we adopt identity-first language, in line with language used by participants in this study.

Parents in youth sport

Parental influence has important implications for young people’s involvement in sport (Holt & Knight 2014). Parents are key social agents (Keegan et al., 2010), who not only motivate children to take up sporting activities, but also play a role in determining whether children benefit from engagement in sport (Neely & Holt, 2014). Researchers have shown that parental involvement in youth sport can be a determining factor in successful sport career transitions (e.g., transition from recreational to competitive sport) (Wuerth et al., 2004). Indeed, recent literature from both academy football (Newport et al., 2021) and youth tennis (Thrower et al., 2016) has indicated parents experience significant psychological and practical (e.g., financial) demands, and may require support to meet these demands so their children can progress in their given sport. Further, how parents engage in the youth sport environment can have both positive and negative impacts on young athletes (Elliott & Drummond, 2017). In this instance, parenting styles are important, and literature shows that autonomy-supportive and authoritative parenting styles are associated with positive outcomes for athletes (Holt & Knight, 2014). However, outcomes associated with parenting in youth sport are dependent on socio-cultural-relational factors between parents, young athletes, their coaches and others in the sport environment (Knight, 2019). To this end, recent work by Dorsch et al. (2022) has outlined the development of a heuristic model for understanding youth sport which encapsulates the interconnectedness of social and environmental systems (i.e. family, team mates and coaches, and the wider sport environment). This model presents an important step toward understanding the complexity of youth sport and the role parents play in this context. However, Dorsch et al. (2022), do acknowledge some limitations including that their model does not account for wider systems, contexts and interactions which might influence youth sport participation, for example schools and teachers. These wider social and cultural contexts may be important factors in understanding initiation and maintenance of sport involvement, particularly for disabled young people who experience significant barriers to sport engagement (Columna et al., 2020).

Furthermore, researchers examining the role of parents in youth sport have moved toward building models to support quality parental involvement in sport to foster positive outcomes for athletes (Knight et al., 2017). Knight et al. (2016) argue that parents adopt varied roles which provide tangible, emotional and informational support to their children. They argue that while parents adopt varied roles, the overall desire is to promote positive experiences and limit exposure to negative experiences, but that parental involvement in sport is determined by a range of contextual and environmental factors (Knight et al., 2016). Furthermore, researchers have examined the positive and negative impacts of youth sport for parents. A review by Sutcliffe et al. (2021) indicates parents invest significant amounts of time, finances and emotion in supporting their child in sport, however, Like Dorsch et al. (2021) note that wider contextual factors need to be accounted for. Parenting in the youth sport landscape is complex (Knight, 2019), and involves intimate interactions between a range of social agents and environmental contexts (Keegan et al., 2010). To this end, Knight et al. (2017:94) state “To expedite our understanding of the influence of parents in sport, ensuring that future research considers and accounts for such complexity is necessary.” However, existing literature seldom accounts for the experiences of parents whose children engage in competitive sport outside of the mainstream. Specifically, it does not account for the complexity of the parenting landscape for parents of disabled young athletes in competitive sport.

Disability, parenting and sport

Parenting a disabled child brings with it added complexity, where several interacting factors impact upon parental coping and resilience (Russell, 2003).These include the child’s diagnosis, and parental experiences leading up to diagnosis; the specific needs of the child (and other siblings); parental support networks; the characteristics of the parent themselves; the availability of local services to meet the needs of the child and the wider family; and the parents expectations for the future (Heiman, 2002; King et al., 1999). Pousada et al. (2013) further argue that there is a multifaceted interaction between parental determinants and potential outcomes for the child, where, for example, a child whose parent has access to a strong and supportive social network, will experience more positive outcomes compared with a child whose parent feels isolated. Despite the existence of literature which explores more general parental determinants surrounding outcomes for disabled children, and the plethora of literature examining the role of parents within youth sport (Dorsch et al., 2021; Knight, 2019), relatively little research has explored the two combined (Martin, 2006).

Of the literature that is available, most investigate parental involvement in community disability sport. For example, a comparative study examining perceptions of parents with and without a disabled child demonstrated that parents of the latter involved in community sport perceive engagement in sport as having an important role in not only empowering their child, providing opportunity for socialization and personal fulfillment, but also helped ease some of the physical difficulties associated with their impairment (Ferrari, 2019). A review by Piškur et al. (2012) showed that parents of disabled young people play an important role in enabling their children to engage in activities. Similarly, Ferrari (2019), showed that physical activity was seen as a vehicle for social engagement, the development of self-confidence and physical development. Piškur et al. (2012) also highlight some barriers to engagement, namely the attitudes of others, insufficient opportunities for engagement outside of school and home, and accessibility barriers in the natural and built environment. Whilst this study did not specifically focus on sport engagement, these barriers have been noted in several other studies relating to the engagement of disabled young people in sport and physical activity (see Columna et al., 2020; Fitzgerald, 2018; Sharpe et al., 2022). Columna et al. (2020) draw out more nuanced barriers to engagement in sport from the perception of parents. They argue that parents recognize that their child’s engagement in sport is their responsibility but note that there are limited disability-specific sporting opportunities and few appropriately qualified sports professionals to enable engagement in community sport.

Importantly, what these studies indicate are that parents recognize the value of sport for their children and act as important social agents in facilitating their child’s engagement. These studies have also proven useful in understanding some of the barriers limiting engagement in sport for disabled young people. However, these young people can and do achieve success in sport beyond community-level engagement (Houlihan & Chapman, 2017), and what is evident from the literature is that parents potentially play a pivotal role in initiating this journey toward sport success. In their study, Houlihan and Chapman (2017) examine talent identification in youth disability sport and indicate that whilst schools are generally seen as an important platform for promoting sport, often they do not provide sufficient opportunity for disabled young people. The implication here is that parents are key stakeholders in providing opportunity for participation in sport at club level, where talent might be identified and nurtured. What is missing from the literature, therefore, is an examination of the role played by parents of elite youth athletes in not only initiating, but also supporting a young athlete’s career in competitive parasport.¹ This population of parents may provide important insight about how disabled young people might be supported by their families to identify opportunities to engage in community sport, as well as identify talent pathways to support progression through to elite levels. This is especially important given the notable barriers disabled youth face in engaging with sport at all levels (Sport England, 2016).

This research, therefore, asked the question “what are parents experiences of supporting their disabled child through their parasport journeys?.” To this end, this research of explores parents’ experiences of their child’s involvement in parasport from initiation and community sport engagement through to elite level competition, and their role in nurturing this progression.

Methodology

Research design

An inductive, interpretivist qualitative design underpinned by existential phenomenology (Grace & Ajjawi, 2010) was employed, using semi-structured interviews with parents of young athletes who compete at an elite level in their respective parasports. Phenomenology is the study of direct, ideographic experience where subjective perceptions and meanings are created through a persons’ reflective experience of a phenomenon (Smith et al., 2009). Existential phenomenology stems from the work of Heidegger whose phenomenological gaze focuses on the importance of life histories (through reflection) for understanding meaning (Burch, 2013). Specifically, he refers to “Dasein,” a concept which situates humans as “there being”—in-the-world beings who continually shape and are shaped by the world around them. From a methodological perspective, it provides researchers with a lens through which to understand individual’s perceptions of self and the external world as critical factors in the understanding of behavior and experience. In the case of this research, existential phenomenology was drawn upon to centralize the voices of a population seldomly represented in sport research—parents of young disabled athletes. Specifically, existential phenomenology allowed us to describe their subjective experiences as they reflect individual values, purposes, intentions, emotions, and relationships. Through their descriptions and reflections on their own lived experience of being a parent of a disabled child and their experience of supporting their child’s successful sport career, we sought to better understand the complex nature of parenting within the United Kingdom (UK) parasport pathway.

Participants

Participants were recruited via social media (Twitter and Facebook) and were asked to register their interest in the research via an online form. Parents were eligible to take part if:

• They were the parent or primary caregiver of a disabled young person who was involved in competitive parasport.

• Their child was under 25 years of age, to reflect UK children’s and disability policy which considers young people to be up to the age of 25. We also acknowledge that disabled youth are likely to start their sport journeys later than non-disabled youth and are more likely to live with/be supported by family into early adulthood.

• Their child was currently competing at UK national or international level in parasport, allowing us to identify parents of young disabled athletes who had progressed from club sport toward competitive/elite parasport.

Twenty-five parents registered their interest to participate in the research, and of these, the parents of 10 young elite athletes (n = 7 male; n = 3 female, mean age = 16.5 years) consented to interview. These 10 interviews involved 11 parents (n = 8 mothers; n = 3 fathers). One interview included both the child’s mother and father. Table 1 provides an overview of the parents (using pseudonyms) who participated in the research.

Table 1. Participant information.

Participant^a	Relation to child	Child gender	Child age	Primary sport	Wheelchair user?	Highest level of competition at time of interview
Julie	Mother	Male	16	Wheelchair basketball	Yes	Selected for GB U23
Alice	Mother	Female	15	Athletics	No	World Dwarf Games
Jane	Mother	Male	25	Wheelchair rugby	Yes	GB Paralympics Wheelchair Rugby
James	Father	Male	14	Swimming	No	British Para Swimming International Meet
Louise and Martin	Mother Father	Female	16	Wheelchair tennis	Yes	World Team Cup
Cherie	Mother	Female	18	Athletics	Yes	CP World Games
Harriet	Mother	Male	19	Wheelchair basketball	Yes	School Games
Kim	Mother	Male	15	Wheelchair tennis	Yes	World Team Cup
Mike	Father	Male	12	Wheelchair tennis	Yes	World Team Cup
Mel	Mother	Male	16	Swimming	No	CP World Games

^aPseudonyms have been used to protect participant identity.

Data collection

Interviews explored parenting values, experiences of parenting a disabled child, roles adopted in facilitating their child’s sporting endeavor and the challenges and successes experienced through their parasport journeys. Questions were broad and open, allowing authentic reflection on their experiences. For example, parents were asked a range of questions including those about their role in their child’s sporting journey and how this changed over time, their values as a parent of a disabled child, and the impact of youth sport on family (and their own personal) life. Interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim prior to analysis. With the exception of one short interview, which lasted 26 min, the remainder had an average length of 83.51 min (range = 54.5–115.29 min). While a short interview would not ordinarily provide sufficient detail for a phenomenological study, we felt it was important and necessary to include this interview in the analysis from both an ethical perspective and out of respect for the time given by the participant to share their experiences.

Apart from one interview, which was conducted by the second author, all interviews were conducted by the first author. Institutional ethical approval was received, and all participants provided written informed consent. Interviews were carried out face to face (n = 3) or via telephone (n = 7) depending on participant location and preference.

Throughout data collection, authors met on a regular basis to reflect on the findings as they developed. During this process, the authors acted as critical friends (Smith & McGannon, 2018), jointly engaging in reflexive and reflective questioning of the data and the ways in which it was being interpreted. In adopting a reflexive approach to the research, the researchers were able to consider their own (sometimes opposing) epistemological and theoretical assumptions, which offered the opportunity for greater rigor to be established. It is worth highlighting the researcher’s positionality at this point. The first author is a non-disabled female who is also a parent (to non-disabled children), while the second author is a male ex-Paralympic athlete (who, prior to competing in the Paralympic Games, was involved in youth sport, supported by his parents) and does not have children. Both have been researching disability sport for over a decade. In acknowledging and reflecting on our own personal and professional experience, we were able reflexively engage with the data, adopting a critical stance by challenging our own perspectives to understand the subjective life-worlds described by participants, recognizing how these differ from our own experiences.

Data analysis

Typically, when adopting a phenomenological approach in research, interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) is the preferred methodology. However, in this research, reflexive thematic analysis (RTA) (Braun & Clarke, 2019) was instead adopted, using phenomenology as a lens through which to read the data. Braun and Clarke (2021) note that IPA is not always suitable, even when a phenomenological approach is adopted. They argue this is especially true of research which seeks to determine actionable outcomes with clear implications for practice; and for research which examines how personal experience might be located within wider socio-cultural issues. For such studies, RTA is better suited. Thus, RTA underpinned by existential phenomenology was adopted within this study.

RTA is an approach to analysis which is theoretically flexible and highlights the researchers’ active role in the production of knowledge. Braun and Clarke (2019, p. 594) argue “RTA is not about following procedures “correctly” (or about “accurate” and “reliable” coding, or achieving consensus between coders), but about the researcher’s reflective and thoughtful engagement with their data and their reflexive and thoughtful engagement with the analytic process.” RTA encourages researchers to examine data closely, allowing interpretations to be made from a bottom-up perspective. In adopting this approach, the phenomenological philosophical lens allowed for the examination of the complexity of participants’ lived experiences. The broad stages outlined by Braun et al. (2016) were followed in terms of moving from familiarization with the data and coding, through to theme development and writing. We acknowledge that in using RTA, the values of this approach are encompassed beyond just the final data analysis, but in the design of the research more broadly.

It was apparent in the early stages of data analysis and through inductive coding of the data that the dataset was complex and “messy.” Parents discussed a range of incidents and events during their child’s and their own life course which had a chronology not neatly reflected in the transcripts (e.g., parents would often recount a recent incident at their child’s school, reflect back on their child’s early years and jump forward to hopes for the future). This is also indicated in the Youth Sport System model put forward by Dorsch et al. (2022), who note time and maturation as important elements in understanding youth sport. Given the significance of the chronology of experiences when reading and coding the transcripts, it was felt an additional step toward understanding the data was needed. Thus, in adopting a traditional approach to RTA, following familiarization with the data, interesting features were highlighted and coded inductively and systematically across transcripts, but to enhance interpretation of the data, a narrative “pen portrait” account of each interview was also developed. The intention here was to provide a chronological account of each participants experiences, drawing out key events, incidents and emotional accounts as they occurred over time. In preparing the narrative accounts, participants’ phrasing was used to limit any misinterpretation of experiences. Figure 1 provides an excerpt from a participant narrative.

Figure 1. Excerpt from analysis narrative.

In doing this, key issues and concepts (e.g., sport for social inclusion, parental roles in facilitating sport engagement, etc.) were drawn out for each participant and this was used alongside the coded transcripts to develop themes which reflected the dataset as a whole. This process of close examination of the ideographic accounts of parents allowed for the phenomenological underpinning of this research to thread through the analysis.

During the final stages of the analysis, authors engaged in critical discussion about theme development to ensure there was agreement about how the overall narrative from the data was understood, as well as the logical ordering of the themes to tell that narrative. In reviewing the theme development and to further enhance the rigor of the research, all participants were sent an extended abstract of the findings following data analysis. Whilst member checking has its criticisms (Smith & McGannon, 2018), the authors determined that it would be useful for participants to reflect on summarized findings prior to publication, particularly as several had asked to be kept informed. Three parents took the opportunity to comment on the findings, all of whom supported the interpretation and offered positive feedback on how the data had been handled.

Four themes were developed: There is No Level Playing Field at School; Routes Toward Parasport; The Roles of a Parasport Parent; and Social and Psychological Impact of Parasport Engagement.

Findings and discussion

There is no level playing field at school

When contextualizing their child’s journey toward parasport, most parents commented on their child’s largely negative experiences at school, and how these contributed to seeking out other opportunities for their child outside of the school environment. This pertained to two key issues—ineffectual physical education and school sport (PESS) opportunities; and a lack of social belonging at school.

Many parents did not feel that PESS offered a level playing field for their child to participate in sport which resulted in their child feeling disengaged, frustrated and, in some cases, excluded from PESS offerings altogether. Alice discusses this in relation to her daughter:

She would be very reluctant to take part in sports day at school or PE lessons and they never really pushed her to because, “oh well what’s the point in her doing running today”, and Jess is like, “right I’m going to come last, there’s no point”. So, she’d just walk! What’s the point in trying? I’m just going to come last anyway, so sports day and that, she didn’t want to ever take part. She would have the opportunity to, but because they wouldn’t push her, she said, “well I don’t want to start the race halfway down the field to all my friends and they still beat me!” So, she never really did it. (Alice)

Alice indicates that her daughter, who has a short stature, was never encouraged to fully engage in PESS offerings at school because both the school and her daughter saw little point given how unlikely it would be for her to perform well against her able-bodied peers. This led to her disengagement with PESS and was a common issue for parents of children with short stature—that there was little opportunity for their children to be able to compete on a level playing field when up against their able-bodied peers. James, who’s sons’ experiences of PESS were more positive than Alice’s daughter, explains:

He does participate in sports at school, but obviously not at a sort of a competitive team level, because he just can’t keep up, you know compete with the able-bodied students. To be honest in year 9 (13-14 years of age), most of the kids are about twice his size, so it’s very difficult. And particularly as the school concentrates on rugby and basketball, so not two sports (laughs), I mean he loves both of them, but not ones that he can really compete on a sort of level playing field there. (James)

James highlights two issues. First, that disabled youth, especially those with physical impairments, do not compete on an equal plane compared to their able-bodied peers. Second, that this is compounded by the competitive nature of team sports often offered by schools in both PE and as extracurricular activities. These experiences of PE are not unique. Several studies have indicated that young people who experience disability have poorer experiences of PESS (e.g., Haegele & Sutherland, 2015; Sharpe et al., 2022). Haegele and Sutherland (2015) indicate that ableist discourses and attitudes within PE are in part responsible for this, contributing to feelings of social exclusion. They argue that these discourses must be disrupted for PESS to become more inclusive.

These ableist attitudes were also apparent for other parents in this study, who indicated that school were not willing to cater effectively for their child’s needs during PESS. Jane, whose son is a wheelchair user, discusses this in relation to accessibility issues and sensitivity surrounding disability in mainstream environments:

He wanted to play sport in school, and he did, but, with the best will in the world, that couldn’t be catered for really at school. In a football team with other able-bodied children, although he did give it a whirl, he definitely did! He was there on sports day, wheeling around in his wheelchair and stuff like that, doing races on grass… In the mainstream system, people were absolutely terrified that he would hurt himself, so they didn’t want him to do stuff that any other child would do, because they thought that either he would hurt himself and they would be liable. (Jane)

Jane raises issues relating to liability. She suggests a reluctance on the part of the school to fully include her son in PESS due to a fear of injury and the risk of legal proceedings. Litigation is a concern for PE teachers who teach disabled students, and McCoy et al. (2017) suggest PE teachers would benefit from education around legal issues relating to student injury and discrimination. Further, researchers have suggested that many PE teachers are simply underprepared and under-trained for matters relating to the effective inclusion of disabled young people, which highlights the need to rethink inclusion training during initial PE teacher education and continued professional development (Penney et al., 2018). This also further highlights ableist attitudes that predominate in PESS. It demonstrates the perpetuation of disabled bodies as “other” (Goodley et al., 2018) and of a fragility further preventing disabled people from suitable access to sporting spaces. Not surprisingly, this is highlighted both within (e.g., Giese & Ruin, 2018) and outside of (e.g., Richardson et al., 2017; Brittain et al., 2020) the PESS literature and speaks to a broader issue of sport as an exclusive space for the most (physically) able. Researchers examining PESS have therefore pointed to a reexamination of how PESS is delivered, with a greater focus on understanding student needs through consultation and collaboration (Sharpe et al., 2022). Echoing this the broader sport and physical activity literature, which has seen co-construction and collaboration positioned as a valuable tool for sport practitioners in designing programmes to best suit the needs of disabled athletes (Allan et al., 2020).

For many parents, PESS offerings were something of a disappointment, particularly as an environment to nurture their child’s interest and talent in sport. For Julie, this is because promises from her sons PE department to develop a personalized programme around his needs and aspirations were never kept:

I have to say, I’m a bit disappointed with the school because when we started going there, we actually went up and met the PE teachers, and they were like, oh really excited, and we’re going to do this, and over the summer I’m going to plan his PE programme and none of it ever happened! (Julie)

Adapted opportunities are quite often underrepresented in mainstream school PESS offerings, and where they are offered, they are ordinarily spearheaded by staff with a particular interest in inclusion (Sharpe et al., 2022). This may explain why talented young para-athletes are often not identified at school (Houlihan & Chapman, 2017). For Julie, her son’s talent and success in sport was highlighted to his teachers, and despite this, provision for him in school was still poor. Although teachers cannot be expected to deliver personalized programmes for all students, a wider issue in relation to disabled young people remains that there are too few opportunities to engage in sport, particularly at school, when compared to mainstream peers. Therefore, schools should work toward developing their curricular and extra-curricular provision so that opportunities exist for all students, including those with disabilities.

A second, broader concern for parents of this study related to their child’s feelings of social inclusion and belonging. For most parents, they felt school offered little for their children in relation to developing meaningful social relationships:

I think one of the things about children with disabilities at school is that they are, in mainstream, is they are really isolated. (Jane)

[Tim] has his moments, he’s emotionally very up and down, and the downs are mainly to do with that, sort of feeling socially isolated and missing out on things. I don’t think it’s been a particularly positive experience, school, even though he’s doing very well at school, socially it’s not that positive an experience. (Julie)

PE is often presented as a core opportunity to develop young people’s social relationships (Opstoel et al., 2020), and literature suggests inclusive PE provision may help develop a sense of social belonging among young people who experience disability (Goodwin & Watkinson, 2000). However, issues relating to a lack of social inclusion led parents in this study toward seeking out alternative social opportunities, and for all who discussed this issue, it resulted in their child engaging in community disability sport where the young people were better able to develop a sense of social belonging:

He goes to an able-bodied school, he’s academically bright, he’s the only wheelchair user in a school of 1700 kids, so it’s really nice to go somewhere a couple of times a week, where they’re all in chairs and he feels like he belongs. (Julie)

Do you know what, she hated sport at school. I got her out of sport, she did nothing. But she saw the [Paralympic] Games and then all of a sudden decided to do it. [Wheelchair racing] is her life. Without this sport she wouldn’t be who she is, it’s her social life, it’s her … it’s everything. (Cherie)

This is discussed in more detail in the next theme; however, these findings illustrate the wider social, interpersonal and environmental contexts impacting on disabled young people’s sport engagement. When considering youth sport systems (Dorsch et al., 2022), it is evident that these contextual issues play a fundamental role in sport engagement for disabled young people.

Routes toward parasport

For most parents we interviewed, their aim had not been to seek out sport with a competitive parasport career in mind for their child. Rather, they sought out opportunities for their child to develop a sense of social belonging, to encourage the development of friendships and to reduce social isolation. Some parents discussed being mindful from early on that their child might face challenges because of their disability. Considering this, they endeavored to seek out opportunities to develop their child’s confidence, esteem and social wellbeing. Julie describes not wanting her son to live a “half-life” and explains how sport has helped her in her endeavor to ensure this does not happen:

When he was a baby, one of my big concerns in the earliest stage was that I didn’t want him to be a shrinking violet or to hide away. I feared that as a disabled person he would have a half-life, if you put it bluntly. I didn’t want him apologising for himself, and if anybody couldn’t handle him, that was their problem, not his. That was my priority. So, if he wasn’t in sport, I suppose I would have looked at other ways to try to not make that happen! But sport has worked out a brilliant way to stop that happening. (Julie)

Lalvani (2015) argues that parents interpret their experiences of raising a child with a disability within the socio-cultural landscape which ascribes stigma and marginalization as a disability narrative. They argue that parents actively produce counter narratives to resist otherness for their children, and this can be seen in the way Julie describes how she actively sought out opportunities for her son. Many of the parents interviewed talked about their fears about their child’s future and how sport presented an opportunity to allay those fears by building their child’s confidence and self-efficacy. For other parents, seeking out sport opportunities was a direct result of their child experiencing social discrimination at school. Alice explains:

When she transitioned up to secondary school at the age of eleven or twelve, is when she actually found sport. Jess was severely bullied and beaten up [at school] because of her differences and, obviously living in [town], there aren’t that many with short stature, so that’s how we became involved with the Dwarf National Games, with the Dwarf Sports Association. She went along to just basically meet up with others like herself, having never done really any sport. She fell in love with athletics and it’s gone from there. (Alice)

What was apparent was that, for most parents, sport was initially seen as an opportunity to support their child’s well-being and development, and none of the parents considered sporting success as an intended goal. Rather, sport was avenue toward something more meaningful for their child—an opportunity to be socially fulfilled; an opportunity to develop a life skill; an opportunity to minimize feelings of difference to others. In doing this, parents were able to produce a counter narrative to one of marginalization, stigma and otherness for their child (Lalvani, 2015), which was perpetuated in school. Becoming an elite sportsperson was an unintended, but positive, by-product of simply wanting their child to feel happy and to have similar opportunities to able-bodied peers, thus challenging the ableist nature of mainstream schooling. Parents believed that sport afforded their children more social capital in a school setting, satisfying parental desire for their children to have social belonging. Mike notes:

Kids like him are so lucky these days because attitudes have changed, especially once you’ve got the sports blade, that gave him a lot of confidence [at school] because it’s seen as kind of quite cool almost. (Mike)

Finding appropriate opportunity for their child to become involved in sport was not easy for parents. Parents frequently indicated that there is a lack of local opportunity for disabled young people to get involved in sport, which made the task of finding appropriate opportunities for their child difficult. This is something echoed in previous research (e.g., Darcy et al., 2017). However, previous literature has not explored how parents find opportunities for their children. In this study, several parents talked about becoming involved in disability-specific organizations (e.g., Dwarf Sports Association; Wheelchair Tennis Association) to identify opportunities for their child to participate in sport. Others discussed the hours of research involved in finding appropriate opportunities, and the need to travel long distances because nothing disability-specific was available locally. When asked how she identified opportunities for her child, Cherie says:

Internet! It’s always internet! I got hold of a few people, they were up in Coventry, and then we went down to Kingston… And it wasn’t easy, it’s not an easy thing to do. I went on it, and phoned a person, and then this person said, oh I lived too far away, phone that person. And that was John, then I spoke to Charlie, and then from Charlie I got to Kingston, and you know … because it was finding people really. But then the main thing is you can’t do it without a chair. So, then I went on the internet and found an old track racing chair on Ebay, which wasn’t the perfect size for her, but it didn’t matter because it’s the only way you’re going to start. (Cherie)

Cherie’s story was similar for many of the parents we interviewed who talked about hours of research to identify clubs where their child could participate in their chosen sport. Indeed, this is also echoed in the work of Bundon and Clarke (2017), who found that para-athletes used the internet to bridge networks with the wider disability community. Their participants reflect on the poor resourcing around disability in youth sport resulting in few opportunities to engage in sport for disabled young people. Parents in this study highlighted that many of the most appropriate opportunities and clubs identified for their children were not local, but in different towns across the country. One parent (Julie) talked about traveling 2 hours each way once a week for 4 years so that their child could attend training because of a lack of local clubs suitable for their child’s needs. James explores this issue further:

I think the main challenge for parents is finding the facilities that will accommodate their child, and it being local. So, not just in swimming but I can imagine in all sports, if you’ve got a disabled child and they’re good at football, finding a football club that will accommodate a disabled child into a football team I think would be really challenging… You’ve got to get them into the right squads and the training has to be adapted and the coaches have to have the right level of training themselves to be able to recognise the differences between an able-bodied athlete and a disabled athlete to make sure that they’re doing things the right way. (James)

James indicates that finding opportunities is difficult, but also highlights the need to find the right clubs with the right coaches who have the relevant knowledge and experience to work in adaptive sports. Allan et al. (2020) argue that coaches play a fundamental role in shaping the experiences of disabled athletes, and thus need particular skillsets to understand and set appropriate goals for their athletes, whose needs can be diverse. However, literature relating to coaching disabled athletes is somewhat limited (Townsend et al., 2015), and tends to relate to coaching elite adult athletes. Thus, more research should examine coaching expertise in youth sport and in recreational settings to better understand the concerns parents raise.

Cherie also alluded to several further issues, common for the parents we talked to. First, that parents need to commit significant time to sourcing opportunities for their child, and second, that there are significant financial implications related to sport engagement for children with a disability, including buying equipment such as wheelchairs, and the cost of travel to non-local clubs. Finally, that “finding people” was important to access sport opportunities for her child. Interestingly, for many parents, talent identification and/or discerning the specific parasport their child garnered success in, came because of a specific individual either pointing out their child’s potential or signposting their child toward a specific sport:

We joined the Dwarf Sports Association in 2012, 2013, and as part of that, because Nick had learnt to swim and could swim reasonably well, we put him in for the swimming competition as part of the National Games. And at the end of that swimming gala, Ellie Simmons’ [Paralympic swimmer] mum, Val, came up to us and said, Nick’s got a really good swimming technique, you should get him into a club! (James)

Ava did the ball-crewing at the British Open with school, and this bloke spotted her with her splints, a guy called Tony Knappet [wheelchair tennis player], asked if she’d like to play. He said, right, locally these are the clubs that are running, and being the British Open, they was [sic] all there, so we got introduced to them. (Martin & Louise)

These factors highlight the difficulty associated with initiating sport participation for young people with a disability, illustrating the complex routes navigated to locate the few-and-far-between opportunities. It also demonstrates the commitment needed from parents to facilitate their child’s engagement in sport. Cherie sums this up by saying, “You have no choice, there aren’t any other options. That’s why you have to have that commitment.”

Our findings showed just how challenging it can be for parents to identify opportunities for their children, and the haphazard routes toward talent identification when disabled children show promise. From an applied perspective, there is scope for sports practitioners who work with disabled athletes at all levels to communicate more clearly about the opportunities available for young disabled people to get involved in sport, and to develop clearer talent identification pathways which are accessible at all levels of sport engagement and reflect the complexity of the lives of disabled people (and their families). Houlihan and Chapman (2017) note that the talent identification pathways for disabled youth often mirror existing pathways developed for non-disabled athletes. However, this reinforces ableist processes which do not acknowledge the diverse and complex experiences and routes into sport for disabled youth. At a community level, there is a need for more local opportunities for disabled young people, particularly those living outside of large cities. At a local government and broader political level, there needs to be better commitment to improving access to sport for disabled youth.

The roles of a parasport parent

Knight et al. (2016) identified four main roles undertaken by sports parents—supporter, administrator, coach and provider. They argue that how parents identify with these roles is determined by a range of contextual and environmental factors. For the parents we interviewed, there were nuances within these roles which related specifically to being a parasport parent:

I’ve always done a lot in terms of finding out about competitions and doing all the liaison, because one of the challenges is belonging to a mainstream club, they’re completely unaware of all the specialist Para-swimming competitions that are going on. So, I’ve had to research those. There’s the practical, getting him to training, making sure he’s got all the equipment he needs. Then at a second level, there’s the emotional stuff, you know encouraging him and talking to him about how he’s doing. There’s also issues around injuries. He has a genetic disorder which means that in his ankle, two bones that aren’t supposed to have got a bit of tissue connecting them and that causes some pain. We’ve been through a whole process of trying to manage it. (James)

Here, James touches on some of these nuances. He indicates that in his administrative role, there is pressure for him to identify para-swimming events for his son to compete in because the mainstream swimming club are not aware of them. He also talks about the additional emotional demand of supporting his child in the management of injuries relating specifically to his disability. This was something discussed by several parents—the management of disability-specific issues, which saw some parents (particularly those whose children were wheelchair users) adopting an additional role in facilitating their child’s engagement in sport, that of a carer.

I have to be with him as his carer because he can’t do his own personal care, so I have to be with him all the time anyway. (Kim)

I do absolutely everything, from going to the toilet beforehand, which is the most crucial thing because, like Millie is fine absolutely with her bladder, but if she does a competition, you know when someone says, ooh I get so excited I’m going to pee myself, well she literally does. So, for a competition, I need to put a pull-up on her, and I need to get her to the toilet, then put her in her track racer, put her helmet on, because she can’t get the fiddly bits of the clips to put the helmet on, put the gloves on, strap her feet … So, it’s from top to bottom to get her in that chair before she races. (Cherie)

For some parents, personal care was an integral part of the role they played in facilitating their child’s engagement in sport, meaning there was a general need for them to be present at events and training for their child to be able to perform, something highlighted as a barrier to recreational sport participation for young people with intellectual disabilities (Darcy & Dowse, 2013). Because of this, some parents noted that while for similar-aged able-bodied children, engagement in sport can be done independently from their parents, for young people with disabilities, this was not always an option. Caring responsibilities alongside transport and accessibility issues meant that parental presence was often a requirement to allow for engagement in sport. Seven of the eleven parents we spoke to either did not work or worked part-time so that they could provide suitable care for their children. Parents noted, however, that as their children got older, they were keen to “take a step back” to support their child’s autonomy and independence; some by employing carers to take on that role. However, this does come at financial cost to parents.

Parents also talked about how they often stepped in to coach their children. This is not unique to disability youth sport—parents in youth sport research are often cited as taking on coaching roles to support their children (e.g., Elliott & Drummond, 2017). However, for parents in this study, their coaching role was often considered necessary because of the societal barriers which limited their child’s opportunities—for example, needing to travel long distances to training, few local opportunities to engage in parasport and limited opportunity to engage with other disabled young people for informal training opportunities. Cherie explains:

“I have helped with the coaching because she can’t always go up to [town], so I will take her to our local track and I’ll know what she needs to do. She gets fairly annoyed with me when I have to do it because if the coach says do this, this and this, it’s fine, but if I say do it … oh mum! I know exactly what she needs to do because I know her, I know what her capabilities are as well, but she doesn’t want me to be telling her what to do, she needs her own coach to be telling her what to do, I’m just mum.” (Cherie)

Cherie highlights tension in her role as a parent and sometimes coach. She perceives a need to support coaching because of constraints which limit her daughter’s ability to get to her club for formal coaching but notes how this strains her relationship with her daughter. These findings highlight that practitioners working to support parents of disabled young athletes should consider the challenges parent’s face when supporting their child’s engagement in sport by developing appropriate mechanisms of support and parent education which reflect the complex social and environmental barriers which persist for disabled people.

Social and psychological impact of parasport engagement

As shown in previous themes, being a parent to a disabled child brings with it complexity. Many parents discussed sacrifices they had made to support their child in sport, but also of the many benefits they felt being involved in sport brought to their families. It was evident that parents needed to make difficult decisions about their own lifestyles to be able to support their children. This included having to work reduced hours or having one parent stay at home; taking on significant financial burden; disruption to family life and dedicating a large amount of time to travel to facilitate their child’s sport engagement.

However, all of the parents interviewed believed the sacrifice was worth it to be able to provide an opportunity which they felt benefited their children in several ways, and in turn, benefited them, reinforcing the counter-narrative they actively seek to engage with (Lalvani, 2015). Jane summarizes this:

There had been such a lot of trauma and upset in the early stages of Blake’s life, so it was an absolute joy to see him participating and having friends and you know that’s life enhancing as a mother, isn’t it? (Jane)

As Jane indicates, one of the primary benefits from a parental point of view, was that sport provided their children with an environment rich in social opportunity where they could meet other children they could relate to. Mel expands on this:

It’s brought him a whole new set of friends … When we go to the disability meets, we meet up with the same group of people all the time. He has really strong friendships there, and what’s great is they’re all equal, so they’re vile to each other, they are absolutely un-PC and totally inappropriate. I think him being in that environment’s been really good because it’s made him more accepting of his condition, that actually he’s got a really good life ahead of him. (Mel)

Mel notes how when her son is with his disabled peers, he is able to explore disability openly with shared understanding. She highlights how this has helped her son to become accepting of his own disability, and like other parents indicates sport has helped to improve his confidence and self-esteem through the opportunity to engage with relatable peers. This was a common point amongst the parents we spoke to:

Sport has given him a massive amount of confidence. He’s become very, very confident. He’s popular at school, which you know when I think back to when I was at school, the kid in his situation would not necessarily have been popular and it’s through his sport and his achievements in sport that’s made him that. (Mike)

This is also examined by Forber-Pratt et al. (2021) who indicate disabled young people actively define and redefine their identity through interaction with both disabled and able-bodied peers. They note how adaptive sports can provide a comfortable space for young people to explore their identity. The social benefits of sport engagement were not only related to their children. Parents also discussed how their own social networks had grown, providing them access to a community of parents who were able to relate to the challenges of being a parent to a child with a disability. Pousada et al. (2013) note that strong social support networks for parents of young people with disabilities are attributed to improved wellbeing. Martin indicates that a support network including other parents of children who experience disability adds value:

There’s a support group within the parents, without a doubt. Sometimes with the support you need in the world of disability, that support network has been really good. You’ve got people who have personal things in their life outside, it’s people to talk to. They can probably relate to it easier than some other people. (Martin)

In addition to developing support networks, parents discussed how seeing their child succeed in sport had helped to alleviate concerns they might have for their child’s future, not only through developing their child’s independence, but also by improving their child’s general health and well-being. Julie explains:

I mean the obvious one for me as a parent was fitness levels - wanting him to be as fit as he could be, wanting him to grow up to be an independent person physically and mentally, and I think it’s helped with all of that, it’s helped with his social confidence, his friendships, physically his upper body is so strong now that you know it means he can be more independent at a practical level. So, I worry less about him going off to university, looking after himself. (Julie)

This is an important psychological buffer for parents of disabled children, who are more likely to experience adverse mental wellbeing (Beresford et al., 2007). It should also be considered within youth sport system theories (Dorsch et al., 2022), in terms of recognizing the meaning of social interactions for both young people and their parents in relation to sport engagement. This is especially relevant to disabled young athletes who may experience feelings of social exclusion in mainstream environments and their parents who have to navigate numerous social and environmental barriers.

Conclusion

While previous research examining the role of parents has focused on mainstream sport engagement for able-bodied athletes (Knight, 2019), this study has demonstrated the complex landscape of parenting within the youth parasport pathway. It has illuminated the experiences of an underrepresented population of parents, their diverse experiences and the ways in which they support their child athletes to engage in competitive sport. The findings show the challenges parents face in supporting their child’s parasport engagement, including financial strain, lack of appropriate local opportunities and the additional roles they must undertake to foster engagement. While parents of able-bodied athletes also experience increased strain relating to the cost and time commitment involved in their child’ youth sport engagement (Dunn et al., 2016), our findings show how these challenges may be magnified for parents of young athletes with disabilities who are navigating a social world designed to exclude or marginalize disabled people (Goodley et al., 2018). Ableism in sport is highlighted in this study through parent’s accounts of the cost of disability-specific sports equipment, the extended travel to disability-specific sports clubs, and the need for parents to invest additional time to attend events to undertake personal care duties above and beyond that which might be expected for similar-aged able-bodied athletes. This is especially true for parents whose children have high support needs. This is further supported by Patatas et al. (2018) who suggest financial constraints related to parasport are often higher than in mainstream sport.

Our research also highlights the various routes into parasport for young people with disabilities. It shows that sport engagement is often a response to parents concerns for their child’s feeling of social belonging, which they report can be limited in mainstream settings. Parasport offers an opportunity for meaningful social interaction and for families to develop positive counter narratives to the existing disability narratives which center on marginalization (Lalvani, 2015). Parasport was seen to offer opportunity to develop support networks with relatable peers who understand disability; and reduce parental concern for their child’s future. Interestingly, because of the lack of local adapted sport opportunity, most parents and their children discovered parasport either through disability-specific organizations, or by happenstance. This is again, a divergence from able-bodied athletes who have increased opportunity to engage in and nurture their talent in sport through PESS and local sports clubs (Houlihan & Chapman, 2017), perpetuating ableist rhetoric. Thus, sport governing bodies should reexamine talent pathways for disabled youth, ensuring talented young people are offered opportunity to progress in sport. This is dependent on there being sufficient opportunity at community level for disabled youth to become involved in sport. Flyerz Hockey, a grassroots disability inclusive hockey initiative supported and promoted by England Hockey, and delivered through mainstream hockey clubs across England, is an excellent example of how sport governing bodies can widen sports participation for disabled people.

This research identifies barriers to sport for young people with disabilities examined in previous literature (e.g., Columna et al., 2020), but also presents new opportunity. Through understanding the perspectives of parents, it is evident that more work needs to be done to bring disability sport to the mainstream, to increase availability of opportunity, and to re-imagine PESS and local community sport offerings for disabled young people. However, this research also highlights the broader cultural, societal and environmental contexts that influence disabled youth’s engagement with sport at all levels. Through the perspectives of parents, we have highlighted how mainstream school and community settings do not provide sufficient opportunity your disabled young people, and how issues relating to social inclusion are at the forefront of parents’ minds when seeking extra-curricular opportunities for their children. We have examined the fears and concerns parents of disabled children have for their children, and the numerous sacrifices and challenges they face to support their children. These issues need to be accounted for when considering models and theories relating to youth sport, like that developed by Dorsch et al. (2022). Wider contextual issues outside of youth sport are significant for disabled youth and need to be reflected in applied thinking about youth sport practice.

This research demonstrates the power of sport engagement for disabled young people and their families, the value of a family identity which embraces disability and the important role parents of disabled young people play in initiating and supporting sport participation. From an applied perspective, it provides practitioners working with families of disabled young people a platform to collaborate and co-construct (Allan et al., 2020) mechanisms of support and education for parents (and young people) which acknowledge the complexity of raising a disabled child in an ableist society and supporting a child in the ableist structures of youth sport (Spencer-Cavaliere et al., 2017). To this end, practitioners should take a critical, reflexive approach when working with disabled young people and their families to acknowledge the ways in which ableist structures may inform their practices. However, we acknowledge that more research is needed to understand how parents of children with disabilities can be supported in youth sport (or indeed how youth sport can better support disabled young people). Due to our focus on elite parasport, our sample included only parents of physically disabled young people. We recognize that disabled people represent a heterogenous population, thus future research should expand by examining parenting in sport for other disabled young people, including those with intellectual disabilities involved in Special Olympics pathways, as well as disabled young people who engage in grassroots community sport. Nevertheless, this research acts an introduction to the experiences of parasport parents to the broader parenting in youth sport literature, which, to date, has largely ignored disability.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Due to the nature of this research, participants of this study did not agree for their data to be shared publicly, so supporting data is not available.

Additional information

Funding

This research received seedcorn funding from Loughborough University.

Notes

1 We acknowledge that not all disabled young athletes will have eligibly classifiable bodies suitable for parasport.