ANALYSIS OF PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT IN DECLINED SPORTS PARTICIPATION AMONG COLLEGE LEVEL STUDENTS

Mr. Nasir Saeed and Dr. Vikas Saxena

Abstract

Parents play a key role in the youth sports experience. They are responsible for the introduction of their children to physical or sporting education and their involvement has been associated with sport participation in early stages. The aims of this study were to find out the role of parental support in declined sports participation at college level. Total Five Hundred (N=500; Male-250 & Female-250) college level students from the city of Bhopal (M.P.) willingly responded to a self designed questionnaire. The results revealed that some parents encourage their children and they also believe that sports keep the children away from evil things but majority of students responded that the main concern of their parents is academic achievements and they also believe that sports will not bring any good change in personality, hence parents discourages the students participation in sports at college level and put pressure to stay focused on academics. Findings of the study suggest that parental involvement can cause pressure on children and can hinder the desire and interest of student participation in sports. A balance between a supporting involvement without putting too much pressure is needed by the parents. To prevent burnout and dropout and to facilitate future practice, parents should be counseled (possibly by a sport educator) on how to positively support their children in sports without hampering the academics results.

Keywords: Family Involvement, Parental Pressure, Academics and Supportive Behaviour.