Eliminating ’scary coach’ behaviour to keep kids in sport

Changing coaches' behaviour to give children a more positive experience of playing sport has been found to change children's intentions to drop out of sporting activity, according to sports scientists at the University of Birmingham, who announce their findings today (20 September 2013) from a 4 year project called 'Promoting Adolescent Physical Activity' (PAPA). During the £2.9 million Euro study, almost 1400 grassroots football coaches attended interactive workshops in England, France, Norway, Greece and Spain where they were taught how to create a motivational atmosphere that would be more effective in creating more empowering sport experiences, and ultimately effective in encouraging children to continue to play sport. With the help of the Birmingham researchers and coach education trainers from the Football Associations in each country, the coaches had the opportunity to attend the Empowering Coaching programme, a theory and evidence based education package created by the University of Birmingham's Professor Joan Duda and further developed for youth football within the PAPA Project. Coaches were encouraged to develop new strategies to use on the playing field that would motivate children by creating a sense of belongingness, giving them autonomy and fostering a sense of competence in and ownership of their sporting activity. Previous research suggests that children are most likely to drop out of sport between the ages of 10 and 14. Often the reason they give up is due to feelings of inadequacy at sport, feeling less competent than others, or having a bad experience with a coach or sports teacher that has put them off.