• Home
  • Advice
  • Baseball
  • Basketball
  • Fitness
  • Football
  • News
  • Racing
  • Soccer
  • Contact
logo
  • Home
  • Advice
  • Baseball
  • Basketball
  • Fitness
  • Football
  • News
  • Racing
  • Soccer
  • Contact
post image

American Parents Are Ruining Youth Sports

The American tradition of getting children involved in school or community sports programs has experienced a decline in recent years. According to a longitudinal survey conducted in 2016 by the National Alliance for Youth Sports, nearly 70 percent of children across the United States stop participating in team sports programs by the age of 13, and the reason most often given in this regard is that children feel that sports activities are no longer fun.

 

While it would be easy to blame Snapchat, Netflix and video games for the decline of youth sports, the reality is that many bully parents are responsible for this unfortunate trend. Recent CBS News and Fox News segments on this issue have featured interviews with clinical sports psychologists who have been retained by children of young athletes for the purpose of pushing them to become better at their chosen sporting discipline, and there is a growing view that overly competitive parents and their behaviors are not consistent with the joy of sports that children are naturally predisposed to feel. When children lose this joy, they rarely get it back.

 

There’s a good chance that you have seen the shocking behavior of terrible parents at their children’s baseball, football, basketball and soccer games; if you have not personally witnessed this extreme form of misguided parenting, you can always visit YouTube and watch many ghastly videos on this subject. Fathers getting into heated arguments with football referees on the sidelines is old news; the latest and most egregious videos are of grandmothers being ejected from the facilities at basketball games, parents physically assaulting each other at soccer matches, and young players berated by relatives at baseball games for errors that even Major League players make.

 

What is dismaying about the current situation of youth sports is that there aren’t that many cases related to parents who believe their talented children are potential gold mines as future professional athletes. In the 21st century, parents are becoming more and more involved in the sporting activities of their children for the wrong reasons; it’s like parents are projecting themselves into the athletic performance of children, and in doing so they are sucking the fun right out of youth sports.

 

You probably know adults who enjoy playing street basketball or five-on-five soccer, but they don’t follow NBA or MLS teams; these are likely youth sports dropouts who lost the love for organized league play, and their parents may bear some responsibility for their current attitudes towards the game. Child psychologists know that youth sports participants mostly enjoy the fun of playing with teammates and being active. Naturally, they also care about winning, but this is not a primary reason for their dedication to sports.

 

The bullying attitudes of many parents are not conducive to what youth sports programs are about, which is getting children interested in athletics for the fun of it. Children who are unreasonably pushed to improve their performance, or who witness ugly parental behavior during games, cannot be blamed for losing interest in sports.

 

Archives

  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • September 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • October 2018
  • July 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • May 2016
  • March 2016
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014

Calendar

June 2019
M T W T F S S
« May   Jul »
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930

Categories

  • Advice
  • Baseball
  • Basketball
  • Fitness
  • Football
  • Lifestyle
  • News
  • Racing
  • Tennis

Copyright aerys sports 2021