Benefits of Sports to Young Athletes

A sport is more than just play to the young athletes. Through sports, a number of benefits are accrued to the young athletes among them an improvement in their physical fitness, self-discipline, coordination as well as providing the children with an excellent opportunity to learn and have insight into teamwork (Beckmann, 2015). The sad reality that is associated with sports among the young athletes is that numerous athletes either have been already or will have been seriously injured by the end of their season. This sad news does not dash the ray of hope neither does it kill the future of sports among the young athletes.

On another side is the good news of the availability of rehabilitative and surgical technology in the field of sports that has made it very easy to attain quick and full physical recovery from an injury. The technological advancement has eliminated possible chances of an end of sports career among the young athletes upon an injury, a situation that existed back then (Lune, 2017).

Another side of the reality associated with physical injury is that the mind is injured as much as the body when a physical injury occurs. This calls for the need to do a mental healing at the same time as when physical healing in taking place or otherwise ensure there is psychological treatment or interventions to the young athlete. Healing of the physical body but neglecting the psychological aspect may lead to limited progress and improvements in the health of an athlete (Hoye, 2005). 

The need to recover as soon as possible and fully from an injury resulting from sports among the young athletes may make them think of any strategies, others of which might not be of much help. While attempting physical recovery, mental recovery should as well not be left behind but instead receive its cure at the same time (Hoye, 2005). According to a research that was conducted on the effectiveness of psychological interventions after sport injury documented in the “ Journal of Sport and Health Science”, it was found that psychological; interventions provide an avenue for increasing the rate of recovery from an injury among young athletes.

The research that incorporated 991 severely injured athletes as the participants aged between 15 and 22 years was conducted to establish which psychological interventions are the most effective for post injury sport. The research had two groups of participants, one having undergone psychological interventions and another that was not engaged in any psychological interventions after surgery operations treat the injury. The findings of the research established that psychological interventions had a great impact in the speeding up the process of recovery of young athletes following an injury (Cresswell, California). Among the interventions tested in the research included keeping perspective, mental imagery, becoming an athlete among other psychological intervention techniques. All the interventions posted positive results and the discussions on each of the interventions and how it contributed to speedy recovered are as shown below; 

Injuries among Young Athletes

It at times feel very low and bad to accept that one is hurt and in most cases when the athlete is more disabled than recovering (Armstrong, 2011). The athlete would always be in pain and would be incapacitated to the extent of not being able to do what he does normally. This condition comes with anger, frustration and depression that may make the athlete think it would be more meaningful to withdraw from life. It should be noted however that these reactions are very normal and to some extent healthy as they provide the young athlete an opportunity to grieve for the loss he has undergone.

Unfortunately keeping the mind in such a condition for a long time would lead to slow rates of physical recovery (Thomas, 2001). It is thus recommended that a young athlete gets over his pity situation after the shortest while possible and shift the mind to recovery. The shift should be done to the present with the athlete asking himself questions like what he would do to recover from his injury and how he would be able to get to a situation that is better than he has been before in terms of physical health. Another aspect of keeping perspective is that the injury may seem a big deal to the athlete at the time he is experiencing it but he should flashback a few year ago and he would notice that it was just but a blip in his sports life and career. This would stir in the young athlete a spirit, urge to move forward, and not give up in life (Strosahl, 2013).

One of the most devastating aspects of injury in sports among the young athletes is that they are not able to do what they were often doing normally. This leaves them at risk of losing the energy that builds in them during such times of injury.  It is for this reason that there is a need for the young athlete undergoing such circumstances to find a reason and course into which he can direct his energy (Green, 2016). This would provide the athlete with what sports was providing him. Such courses or activities may include but not limited to cooking, school, playing musical instruments and reading. The integral aspect of this intervention is to find something that the young athlete can fully indulge in and care about to the tune of the care he attached to sports. This will make the young athlete have an improved an positive feeling towards himself therefore making him still be in a position to attach value to his life. Still, it will also help the young athlete lift off his mind from the disappointment resulting from the injury and the challenge of the recovery. 

Rehabilitative and Surgical Technology

There are high chances that the lives of young athletes revolve around sports and that getting an injury may make them feel a distance and aloof from the sports which is their favorite and the cause of their suffering. The isolation from sports may influence negatively on the motivation as the young athlete may feel he is not experiencing the many enjoyable things and the fantastic moments that he often enjoyed from sports (Walliman, 2000). Young athletes may feel they are not experiencing the fun, excitement, camaraderie and the inspiration they get from their teammates.

This raises the need for the young athletes to find means and ways of being connected back to their sports. Among the ways could be the young athlete becoming an apprentice coach. Becoming an apprentice coach would help the athlete in learn more on the techniques of the sport (Black, 1999). Still, the athlete may help out at competitions or during practice of his teammates as well as engaging in physical conditioning especially around the injury when the team is engaged in its regular physical fitness sessions. This might be a bit challenging for the injured young athlete, as he may not like watching his competitors or teammates move ahead of him during the sessions. It is however important to notice that watching other teammates having fun as well as having connections with sports may significantly impact positively on the injured athlete and thus motivating a rehabilitation and sooner getting back to the field.

By watching videos of oneself and televised competitions of who a young athlete feels are his heroes can help him keep his mind in shape.  Through watching videos, young athletes are able to keep their minds in focus as they undergo the recovery process. This can even be improved further by the young athletes watching their videos as frequent as possible to help them keep a sharp image of how they were performing in sports (Thomas, 2001). By watching televised competitions of the favorite athletes and sport of an athlete, the young athlete gains inspirations as well as learning about new techniques. The young athlete will  be able to recall that quite a good number of the good athletes he is watching have returned from serious injuries just like the one he is experiencing.

Mental imagery is the most important to mental recovery. Imagery is not just about anything that goes in the mind or head of an individual but instead an illustration of the correlation between the body and the mind. Imagery activates the muscles of the body thereby making the athlete feel in a similar way, as he would actually be playing sports however not at the same intensity levels. Mental imagery fools the body and drives it into thinking that one is highly engaged in performing the sport he likes (Bryman, 2015).

The Importance of Mental Healing

By engaging in consistent mental imagery, an athlete is able to improve on his sports performance skills without necessarily involving in actual training. This means through engaging in mental imagery, a young athlete is able to maintain his skills in sports or even improve such skills (Jones, 2004). Feeling and seeing oneself through the eye’s mind to be continuously practice and compete  helps in keeping up the motivation of the young athlete. This is so as he would be inspired to return to his sport. Mental imagery also helps in raising the confidence levels since the athlete would always see himself regularly performing extremely well. Still, mental imagery helps in focusing the mind of the injured young athlete since the mental muscles would be engaged hence maintaining them in shape. Mostly importantly, mental imagery helps in making the young athlete feel he is still making tremendous progress as a sports athlete.

Injuries teach young athletes to be tough and enduring to hardships hence making them find a motivation for sports (Black, 1999). Through injuries, young athletes are able to give attention to their areas of weaknesses in their sports that they have had time to focus on. An example is a knee injury. Even though a  knee injury could be very painful and may prevent the young athlete from doing a lot of activities, it is an excellent opportunity to make the necessary improvements around the knee. Such improvements may be among them an increase in the stamina, an improvement in the flexibility of the athlete as well asd strengthening of the upper body and the core. The aim of this intervention is to enable the young athlete get back to his sports a physically better sportsman than before (Armstrong, 2011). 

Qualitative data analysis would be the most appropriate method to be used in conducting this research. A comparison group between randomized control trials and non-randomized control trials would be used before and after the designs of the study to do the analysis (Field, 2017). The participants of the study will be recreational athletes who are aged 17 years and below and are in states of severe injury. Sever injury in this research and study methodology is defined as such an injury that lasts at three a month after the play. The interventions will not be inclusive of children and typical adolescents due to reasons attached to the differences in the strategies of psychological interventions that are employed to the youth and the children.

The interventions would involve an investigation into the effectiveness of psychological interventions in suppressing post-surgery symptoms and determining the level of psychological coping among the injured athletes (Green, 2016). The psychological interventions in this study were defined as the same deployed by psychological intervention strategists including mental imagery, becoming a better athlete, keeping perspective and relaxation. Data analysis techniques including interviews and observations by the researcher will be deployed as the data collection methods. The different groups of participants will be asked questions pertaining to how they feel as they progress with their recovery processes under the various conditions. Statistical analysis tools among them averaging, mode and other tools will be used in the analysis of the data. The group that showed the fastest level of recovery and the level will be determined using the tools for statistical analysis (Bell, 1999). 

References

Armstrong, N. (2011). The Elite Young Athlete. Kansas: Karger Medical and Scientific Publishers.

Beckmann, J. (2015). Sport Psychological Interventions in Competitive Sports. New York: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Bell, J. (1999). Doing your Research Project: A Guide for First Time Researchers in Education. London: Sage.

Berg., L. a. (2017). Qualitative Research Methods for Social Sciences. London: Pearson.

Black, T. (1999). Doing Quantitative Research in Social Sciences: An Integrated Approach. London: Sage.

Bryman, A. (2015). Social Research Methods. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Cresswell, J. (California). Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative and Mixed Methods Approaches. 2013: Sage.

Field, A. (2017). Discovering Statistics Using SPSS. London: Sage.

Graham, R. (2014). Sports-Related Concussions in Youth: Improving the Science, Changing the Culture. Chicago: National Academies Press.

Green, K. (2016). Routledge Handbook of Youth Sport. London: Routledge.

Hoye, R. (2005). Sports Management. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.

Jones, G. C. (2004). Research Methods for Sports Students. London: Roitledge.

Khan, K. (2011). Brukner & Khan’s Clinical Sports Medicine. Sydney: McGraw-Hill Education Australia.

Strosahl, K. D. (2013). A Practical Guide to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. New York: Springer Science & Business Media.

Thomas, N. (2001). Research Methods for Physical Education. Leeds: Human Kinematics.

Walliman, N. (2000). Your Research Project: A Step-by-Step Guide for the First Time. London: Sage.

Williams, C. (2003). Data Analysis and Research for Sport and Exercise Science: A Guide Student. London: Routledge.