Burnout and the Changing Landscape of Youth Sport

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Burnout and the Changing Landscape of Youth Sport

• Tom Raedeke
• East Carolina University
• raedeket_at_ecu.edu

Youth Sport Specialization Is It Too Much Too
Soon? Colby-Sawyer March 2010
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Overview

• Setting the stage Importance of the Burnout
  Issue
• What is burnout?
• Is it prevalent?
• Impact on athletes
• What Causes of burnout
• Chronic Stress
• Erosion of Motivation
• Prevention strategies

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Defining Features
Sport Devaluation
Low sense of Personal Accomplishment
Emotional Physical Exhaustion

• Other key features
• Relatively Chronic State
• Different than sport drop out

Raedeke (1997) Raedeke Smith (2009)
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What is Burnout?
Exhaustion
Reduced sense of accomplishment
Devaluation
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The Changing Landscape of Youth Sport

• BurnoutA phenomenon on the rise (or at least
  increasingly discussed)
• Sport specialization at young ages
• Near year round training
• Professionalization of youth sport
• Increasing training demands

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9000m per day
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How Prevalent is Burnout?

• How prevalent is it?
• We arent really sure-

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Negative Ramifications

• Negative Impact on Athletes Sport Experiences
• Performance decline
• Decreased motivation
• Dropout
• Negative impact on team climate

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Negative Ramifications

• Negative Impact on Well-Being and Health
• Mental Health
• Depression
• Self-esteem
• Illness susceptibility
• Substance abuse

Cresswell Eklund, 2006
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What Causes Burnout?
Chronic Stress
Burnout
-
Stress Perceived imbalance between task
demands and resources
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What makes sport demanding?

• Training Demands
• Overtraining
• Too much training with too little recovery
• Time demands
• Lack of improvement

Gustaffson et al. 2007 Kentta et al 2001
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What makes sport demanding?

• External Influences
• Parents
• Overinvolved
• Supportive, but family life centers around sport
• Lots of time and money invested into sport
• No break from sport
• Pressure from coaches
• Negative coaching style
• Pressure to win
• Building credentials
• (Raedeke, Lunney, Enables, 2002 Gould et al.
  1996)

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What makes sport demanding

• Internal Demands (personality)
• Perfectionism
• Trait Anxiety
• Contingent Self-esteem
• Pessimism/Optimism

(Appleton et al, 2009 Chen et al., 2009 Hill et
al, 2009
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What about the resource side of the picture?

• Strong ResourcesLess Stress and Handle Demands
  Better
• Social Support
• Lifestyle Management
• Mental Skills Training
• Life balance

Raedeke Smith, 2004 Gould et al. 1996
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Stress Perspective Summarized
Personality
Coping Resources
Lifestress
Perceived Stress

• Perceived Overload (exhaustion)
• Unmet goals/expectations (reduced accomplishment)
• Lack of enjoyment/meaning (devaluation)

Smith, 1986 Goodger et al. 2007
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Burnout-Erosion of Motivation

• Burnout stems from a lack of fulfillment and
  failure to find meaning in sport
• While everyone can experience stress, burnout can
  only be experienced by people who entered their
  careers with high expectations, goals, and
  motivation--people who expected to derive a sense
  of significance from their work (Pines, 1993)
• State of fatigue or frustration brought about by
  devotion to a cause or way of life that failed to
  produce expected reward (Freudenberger and
  Richelson, 1980)

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Burnout Loss of Meaning

• Athletes feel they are trapped, stifled, and that
  they are wasting time in sport while missing out
  on other life opportunities

Bottom Line Being an athlete and athletic
success dont seem as important or significant
as they used to
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Why Does Sport Lose Meaning?

• Why do athletes participate? What do they expect
  to gain from sport participation?

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Goals and Expectations

• Enjoyment---To have fun
• CompetenceTo be successful
• AffiliationTo be part of a team

What causes burnout? Unmet goals and expectations
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More On Loss of Meaning
Coakley (1992) Black Smith, 2008 Raedeke
(1997).
Unidim Identity
BURNOUT
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Burnout linked to erosion of commitment

• Two faces of commitment
• Attraction (enjoyment)-based Commitment
• Because they want to be involved
• Satisfaction, love of sport
• Passion
• Entrapment-based Commitment
• Because they have to be involved
• Obligation
• Burnout

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Burnout and Commitment
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Entrapment
Coakley (1992) Raedeke (1997) Schmidt Stein
(1991)
Entrapment

Investments Social constraints Lack of
Alternative Options Control Identity
Decreasing Benefits Increasing Costs Decreasing
Enjoyment
BURNOUT
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Preventing Burnout Secondary Individual
Approaches

• Teach athletes how to deal with the demands of
  training and competition
• Target Individual Athlete
• Typical Approach Stress Management
• Limit Does not treat source of problem

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Organizational Approach Primary Prevention

• Maslach Truth About Burnout
• Organizational/situational factors play a larger
  role in burnout than individual characteristics
• Approach Take preventative steps to improve the
  quality of athletes sport experience (work
  culture)
• Target The structure of sport, coaches and
  parents

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Prevention is more effective than intervention
An Ounce of Prevention is Worth A Pound of Cure

• Secondary individual approaches do not work as
  effectively as primary prevention

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Psychological Stress Teach Athletes to Manage
Stress

• Individual Centered Intervention Approaches
  Stress Management
• Identify what is causing stressdevelop plan for
  dealing with it
• Teach athletes how to handle stress/pressure
  (mental skills training)
• Relaxation, goal setting, anxiety management,
  self-talk
• Constructive outlooks on adversity/slumps/lack of
  improvement
• Develop coping resources (e.g., lifestyle mgt,
  social support)

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Preventing Burnout

• Training demands
• Balance training demands and recovery
• Schedule recovery periods/time-outs
• Dont increase training demands when other
  stressors are on the rise
• Focus training plan on long term developmentnot
  short term gain

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Psychological Stress Primary Prevention
Strategies (empower athletes)

• Parent Education
• Develop a Positive Coaching style
• Empathy
• Quality teaching and instruction
• Reinforcement
• Instruction
• Encouragement
• Autonomy supportive versus coercive environment
• Choice, ownership, involvement, rationale
• Mastery versus performance oriented motivational
  climate

• Price Weiss, 2000
• Raedeke Smith

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• Performance Climate
• Winning is emphasized
• Shift in focus from learning to performing skills
• Team with fewest mistake win
• Mistakes are viewed as failure
• Focus on social comparison

• Mastery Climate
• Why participate
• The joy is the journey
• The process
• What is reinforced, emphasized, and valued?
• Effort
• Learning and Improvement
• Mistake part of learning

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Commitment Ideas

• Keep passion alive (enjoyment and benefits)
• Incorporate the things that make sport meaningful
  into sport experience
• Break monotony of practice
• Identify positive things about being an athlete
  and what youd miss if left sport
• Help athletes connect with joy of sport
• Keep the fun factor high

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• Keep investments in balance
• Add energizers into week
• Strive for life balance
• Leave sport on the playing field
• Social constraints and control
• Ensure that significant others (coaches, parents)
  are a source of support and not stress
• Play for own reasonsnot others
• Create an autonomy supportive environment
• Give athletes meaningful control
• Foster a multidimensional identity

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Questions, Comments, Problems, Contentions, or
Objections?