Q: What are the psychological
and physical benefits associated with athletic participation for
girls?
A: According to the Women's Sports Foundation website
(www.womenssportsfoundation.org):
· Teenage female athletes are less than half as likely to
get pregnant as female non-athletes (5% and 11%, respectively),
are more likely to report that they had never had sexual intercourse
than female non-athletes (54% and 41%, respectively), and are more
likely to experience their first sexual intercourse later in adolescence
than female non-athletes (The Women's Sports Foundation Report:
Sport and Teen Pregnancy, May 1998).
· Women who are active in sports and recreational activities
as girls feel greater confidence, self-esteem and pride in their
physical and social selves than those who were sedentary as kids
(Miller Lite Report, 1985; Melpomene Institute, 1995).
· Exercise and sport participation can be used as a therapeutic
and preventive intervention for enhancing the physical and mental
health of adolescent females. It also can enhance mental health
by offering them positive feelings about body image, improved self-esteem,
tangible experiences of competency and success and increased self-confidence
(Physical Activity & Sport in the Lives of Girls, PCPFS, 1997).
· Physical activity appears to decrease the initiation of
high-risk health behavior in adolescents girls. According to a 1995
survey of boys and girls ages 12-16, female adolescents high in
leisure time physical activity are significantly less likely to
initiate cigarette smoking than those in moderate and low leisure
time activity groups (Aaron, et al, Medicine and Science in Sports
and Exercise, 1996; 27, 1639-1645).
· Research suggests that girls who participate in sports
are more likely to experience academic success and graduate from
high school than those who do not play sports (Wilson Report, 1989).
· Women student-athletes graduate at a significantly higher
rate (69%) than women students in general (59%) (2001 Division I
NCAA Study on Graduation Rates, 2001).
· Half of all girls who participate in some kind of sports
experience higher than average levels of self-esteem and less depression
(Colton & Gore, Risk, Resiliency, and Resistance: Current Research
on Adolescent Girls, Ms. Foundation, 1991).
· One to three hours of exercise a week over a woman's reproductive
lifetime (the teens to about age 40) may bring a 20-30% reduction
in the risk of breast cancer, and four or more hours of exercise
a week can reduce the risk almost 60% (Journal of the National Cancer
Institute, 1994).
Sport is where boys have traditionally learned about teamwork,
goal-setting, the pursuit of excellence in performance and other
achievement-oriented behaviors - critical skills necessary for success
in the workplace. It is no accident that 80% of the female executives
in Fortune 500 companies self-identified themselves as having been
"tomboys". In this economic environment, the quality of
our children's lives will be dependent on two-income families. We
must train our daughters as well as our sons. So, it is against
this backdrop of the significant health benefits of sports participation
for girls and women that the politics of gender equity in sport
must be discussed.
