Pinker notes that ‘recreational violence has a long ancestry in our lineage’ but gives the the banning of dodgeball in the USA as an example of its decline (p. 379).
http://www.usatodayhss.com/news/article/new-hampshire-school-district-bans-dodgeball
Former England cricket captain Mike Atherton notes that professional sport accounts for a fraction of all sport played http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Atherton. In professional sport ‘losing is unacceptable ... it often has serious consequences, even though losing is central to any sporting endeavour’. ‘This sliver of the nation’s sporting life has a manifestly disproportionate impact ...
Professional sport
Modelling sport
Football: a season of two halves
See also ‘Mathematics’
School sport
... This impression of the dangerous effects of the win-at-all-costs professional sporting life was given empirical support by a survey carried out by MCC and Chance to Shine. There are three options:
.1 Do nothing
.2 Call for less competitive sport in schools and more sport for fun. (The Women’s Sport and Fitness Foundation; Australian Sports Commission)
http://www.wsff.org.uk/ ; http://www.ausport.gov.au/
Criticism: promotes the notion that everyone can be a winner all the time; the medals and prizes for all philosophy (American Youth Soccer Organisation http://www.ayso.org/home.aspx )
.3 Teach that ‘losing is perfectly acceptable; more than that it is from time to time an entirely good thing’. In non-professional sport there are no adverse consequences to losing.
Positive Coaching Alliance ‘does not pretend that winning does not matter – it absolutely encourages fierce competitiveness – but it promotes to the same degree those life skills to be taken from sport ... dual goals (‘better athletes’, ‘better people’) and encourages athletes to think of their own development on three levels: how they can have a positive influence on themselves, their team-mates and their sport, whatever the result of the game.
How schoolchildren responded to the questionnaire:
Q1 Do you feel under pressure to win when you are playing sport?
Q3 Do you think your team mates feel under pressure to win?
Q1 All the time, 13%; frequently, 23%; sometimes 42%; no 18%; don’t play 4%
Q3 All the time, 17%; frequently, 31%; sometimes 42%; no 10%
Q2 Where does the pressure mostly come from?
Other children including team mates, 47%; me 22%; teachers, 12%; coaches, 10%; parents, 7%; siblings, 1%; parents of other children, 1%; other members of my family, 0%, other, 0%.
Q4 Where does the pressure felt by your team mates mostly come from?
Other children including team mates, 46%; me 19%; teachers, 14%; coaches, 11%; parents, 10%; other members of their family, 0%, other, 0%.
Q5 Do you think this pressure felt by your team mates causes them to cheat or to bend the rules?
Q5 All the time, 6%; frequently, 14%; sometimes 44%; no 36%;
Q7 If your teammates had a chance to cheat and get away with it would they do so?
Q7 Every time, 10%; frequently, 17%; sometimes 49%; no 24%;
Q8 Why do you think your team mates would cheat?
Always want to win, 42%; don’t want to lose a particular match,35%; pressure to win, 33%; can get away with it, 31%; it’s part of the game, 7%
Q9 If your team mates win by cheating, how does it make them feel?
Don’t care, 37%; don’t cheat, 20%; winning is the most important things to them, 19%; guilty, 16%; happy or proud, 6%; other, 2%
Q10 How do you feel / would you feel if the opposition cheated and got away with it?
Angry, 53%; frustrated, 50%; disappointed, 37%; disgusted, 23%; helpless 10%; don’t care, all part of the game,6%; jealous, 6%; violent, 4%; impressed, 2%; other, 1%
‘Pressure cooker’ of school sports turning children into a win-at-all costs generation
http://www.chancetoshine.org/media/press-releases
The Times (2013) Valuable lessons that defeat teaches young. Mike Atherton. Thursday October 3, p. 69