Is the argument that the pychological stress of being thrust onto the big stage is harder for a 13-year-old to handle than a 16-year old? (I would like to see some studies to support this claim.)
High performance sports is related to a number of medical and psychological issues and is often criticised - even if only adults participate in it. It is a general consensus that the earlier an athlete starts intensive training the more serious psychological and medical issues. Paediatricians consider intensive training for children as dangerous and debatable and would prefer extended medicalsupervision and special instruction and schooling for parents and coaches. To underline this statement I start with these two introductory quotations, one of them from the American Academy of Pediatrics, the full text of that article is available under the link provided and a great read.
Physical activity is important for performance and health during the growing years and later. It is a factor in the prevention of artheriosclerotic disease, hypertension, obesity, diabetes type 2, some types of cancers, osteoporosis, and muscular problems. Specialisation in sports should normally be postponed until late puberty, even by those who aim at high performance.
NorwegianTidsskr Nor Laegeforen. 2000 Oct 10;120(24):2908-14. Review
Children involved in sports should be encouraged to participate in a variety of different activities and develop a wide range of skills. Young athletes who specialize in just one sport may be denied the benefits of varied activity while facing additional physical, physiologic, and psychologic demands from intense training and competition. [...]
Most Olympic sports have selection processes that attempt to identify future champions and initiate specialized training---often before the prospect finishes elementary school. The lure of a college scholarship or a professional career can also motivate athletes (and their parents) to commit to specialized training regimens at an early age. The low probability of reaching these lofty goals does not appear to discourage many aspirants.
To be competitive at a high level requires training regimens for children that could be considered extreme even for adults. The ever-increasing requirements for success creates a constant pressure for athletes to train longer, harder, more intelligently, and, in some cases, at an earlier age. The unending efforts to outdo predecessors and outperform contemporaries are the nature of competitive sports. The necessary commitment and intensity of training raises concerns about the sensibility and safety of high-level athletics for any young person [...]
Anecdotal reports suggest risks of "burnout" from physical and emotional stress, missed social and educational opportunities, and disruptions of family life. Unrealistic parental expectations and/or exploitation of young athletes for extrinsic gain can contribute to negative psychological consequences for elite young athletes..
PEDIATRICS Vol. 106 No. 1 July 2000, pp. 154-157 AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS: Intensive Training and Sports Specialization in Young Athletes
This abstract includes several important aspects - I found further information on these aspects and will concentrate on them later on. But first I would like to talk about injuries in general, the actual topic of the TIME article.
Injuries
Joesitz said:
There is no way this will prevent young would be skaters from trying bigger tricks. It might be a little possible if certain tricks are prohibited in figure skating, like Arabian Cartwheels.
You are probably correct - it won't prevent them from trying the big tricks. But that's no justification for putting the athletes under more pressure by encouraging them even more to try the big tricks.
We all know that injuries happen often in figure skating - but they happen in every sport. They can turn out to be more severely if someone is younger - but as a child you can also fall from a tree, hurt yourself severely while playing recreational soccer with you friends etc. It is important to point out the differences between the injured recreational child-athlete and the injured elite competitive child-athlete. So
Mathman, this is for you... 16 is certainly not the ideal age to be thrown into senior competitive skating but I hope that I can show you with this - that 13 is even less ideal.
Apart from the bodily harm itself - every injury/illness is affecting the psychological status of a person. The more severe the injury and the more important the affected organ/body part for the individual - the more severe are the psychological effects. 30% of the patients who suffered a heart attack will suffer from a depression at some time after the attack - extreme example, but the point is that the patient feels helpless, out of control and threatened by his own body. Cancer, heart attacks etc. threaten your life - sports injuries threaten the career, everything the athlete has worked for. That makes them nearly as challenging and threatining as a heart attack.
[...] revealed that injured athletes exhibited greater depression and anxiety and lower self-esteem than controls immediately following physical injury and at follow-up 2 months later. These findings supported the general observation that physically injured athletes experience a period of emotional distress that in some cases may be severe enough to warrant clinical intervention.
Psychological consequences of athletic injury among high-level competitors. Res Q Exerc Sport. 1994 Dec;65(4):347-54.
The psychological effects of an injury can be rather extreme - one paper (
Injured Athletes and the Risk of Suicide. J Athl Train. 1994 Dec;29(4):337-341.) describes 5 case studies where college athletes suffered from a severe postinjury depression and attempted suicide. The article cites that an injury as a psychosocial risk factor is very important among adolescents.
The psychosocial aspect of an injury is very important - even among young athletes and especially in a sport as expensive as figure skating. Children (the psychological definition considers everyone till the age of 16 as children - I am not trying to confuse you) aren't stupid, they know very well how much their parents and their siblings sacrifice for them - they know how much they sacrifice themselves. An injury doesn't just endanger the health of a child, it endangers its career, its dream - the dream of an entire family.
The psychological consequences of a severe injury are devastating for a child. And the higher the competition level, the more prestigious the competition - the more devastating an injury is for a child. Little Miss Zhang competed against the world elite, what am I talking about - she belongs to the work elite! What would happen to her if she suddenly got a career-threatening injury? There are children all over the world facing life-threatening illnesses - but do we have to create artificial situations where young children already fear for their health and their careers?
Joe said that the girls try the big dangerous tricks anyway, so why not let them compete in senior competitions? On the one hand - Caroline Zhang and Mirai Nagasu didn't have a Triple-Triple last year at junior worlds and correct me if I am wrong - didn't they both work really hard on them because they were planning to compete in senior competitions? On the other hand - it is a difference between trying new moves and jumps in training and specifically training them for competitions. If you are under pressure, the risk for injury is significantly higher.
The results of the analytic component of the study alluded to the potential role of competitive level and maturation rate in the profile of the injury-prone gymnast. Specifically, rapid periods of growth and advanced levels of training and competition appeared to be related to injury proneness.
An epidemiologic investigation of injuries affecting young competitive female gymnasts. Am J Sports Med. 1989 Nov-Dec;17(6):811-20. Review.
If a child starts intensive training at a young age - the probability for injuries increases compared to the probability of a recreational child-athlete. If the child also performs at a competitive level the probability increases again, if the child starts taking part in competitions early, it is more likely to have had injuries than the child that started rather late. If the level of competition is higher, the pressure is higher, the training is harder - even more injuries. And the earlier you start taking part in high-profile competitions the more injuries you will suffer.
The injuries have a long-term affect on athletes, they suffer from anxiety during competitions and because of that are more likely to make mistakes and injure themselves.
The more-injured gymnasts were more anxious and tired, and reported higher scores on the CSAI-2 Cognitive Anxiety scale. Males could be differentiated from females by scores on the CSAI-2 Self-confidence and the POMS-BI Composed-Anxious, Confident-Unsure, Energetic-Tired, and Clearheaded-Confused scales. The female gymnasts were more anxious, unsure, tired, and confused, and reported lower levels of CSAI-2 Self-confidence. The findings were interpreted as further evidence of the anxiety-injury link in athletes.
Injury, anxiety, and mood in competitive gymnasts. Percept Mot Skills. 1994 Jun;78(3 Pt 1):955-62.
The female elite athlete
Research indicates that female athletes from all sports are at risk for developing disordered eating. amenorrhea, and resulting complications. These disorders, termed the female athlete triad by the American College of Sports Medicine, may lead to significant morbidity and mortality as well as medical and psychological problems. When female athletes feel pressured to fit a specific physical image, they may develop distorted body images and show disordered eating patterns. Menstrual dysfunction and premature osteoporosis may result from inadequate nutrition combined with excessive athletic training.
Psychol Rep. 2001 Jun;88(3 Pt 2):1153-60. Counseling female athletes: [...] avoid disordered eating, amenorrhea, and osteoporosis
The age requirement in figure skating and gymnastics concern mostly the girls - so I want to talk about the specific problems female athletes face. A few explanations: amenorrhea = no menstruation, oligomenorrhea = irregular, dysfunctional menstruation, menarche = begin of menstruation. Amenorrhea is related to a number of pathological and psychological reasons. Nowadays it often occurs among girls who suffer from eating disorders - or young female athletes. Scientists assume that amenorrhea had its reason during the evolution - a woman who starved or was overly stressed should not have a child. But it is not normal, not physiological - and it indicates that something is severely wrong with the girl / woman.
Most of the effects are reversible (would have been a pretty stupid construction mistake otherwise) - but there are concerns that some problems remain.
Infertility, which may develop with exercise, is probably reversible with reduction of exercise or weight gain. [...] Oestrogen replacement therapy is often prescribed in amenorrhoeic athletes, but bone loss may not be completely reversible.
Baillieres Best Pract Res Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2000 Mar;14(1):37-53.The female athlete.
There are multiple reasons for these dysfunctions, all mentioned in this article about a study among female ballet-dancers.
Intensity of exercise and low energy consumption, specific type and amount of training, early age at initiation, previous menstrual dysfunctions, low body mass index (BMI) or percentage body fat, pathological feeding habits and psychological stress have been suggested as potential factors accountable for menstrual irregularities in female athletes. [...] In ballet dancers, high-intensity training was associated with late onset of menarche, menstrual disorders, lower weight and height development, and abnormal feeding behaviors.
Gynecol Endocrinol. 2006 Jan;22(1):31-5. Influence of high-intensity training and of dietetic and anthropometric factors on menstrual cycle disorders in ballet dancers.
Once again for
Mathman - where is the difference between starting to compete at the age 13 and at the age of 16? The earlier you start to compete with the big guns - the more training you will do (e.g. Zhang, Lipinski). And the harder and earlier you train - the more significant are the medical problems, in this case development problems among girls.
Age at menarche and menstrual periodicity of 21 college swimmers and 17 runners were studied in relation to the age of initiating training. The 18 premenarche-trained athletes had a mean menarcheal age of 15.1 +/- 0.5 years, whereas the 20 postmenarche-trained athletes had a mean menarcheal age of 12.8 +/- 0.2 years, similar to that of the college control subjects, 12.7 +/- 0.4 years. Each year of training before menarche delayed menarche by five months (0.4 years). Of the premenarche-trained athletes, 61% had irregular menstrual cycles and 22% were amenorrheic, whereas 60% of the postmenarche-trained athletes had regular menstrual cycles and none were amenorrheic. Training increased the incidence of oligomenorrhea and amenorrhea among both premenarche- and postmenarche-trained athletes. Metabolic and hormonal changes consequent to an increased lean/fat ratio may explain these findings.
JAMA. 1981 Oct 2;246(14):1559-63.Delayed menarche and amenorrhea of college athletes in relation to age of onset of training.
Of course it is possible to say that there are no significant consequences and that it is not dramatic. But I call it dramatic if a young girl / woman suffers from a medical condition that is mostly known as an epiphenomenon of famines and serious illnesses. The psychological effects of a delayed puberty cannot be neglected either.
Eating disorders and nutritional concerns
Compared to athletes in team sports, participants in weight-control sports may be at greater risk of failing to meet requirements for energy, protein, and some micronutrients. [...] Acute issues such as heat illness and chronic concerns that include impaired growth and development, and the risk of injuries that include stress fractures may be an outcome of inadequate nutrition during physical training.
Nutrition. 2004 Jul-Aug;20(7-8):620-31. Nutritional concerns for the child and adolescent competitor
A stress fracture is one of the most common injuries among figure skaters - I chose the abstract above to emphasise that there are multiple reasons for stress fractures. Other sports are very demanding too - but stress fractures are more frequent in gymnastics and figure skating, in soccer it is so rare that it is in our news if a halfway famous soccer player has a stress fracture. While reading through these articles I asked myself what kind of control systems do the federations have? Is there an annual physical? Are there regular and objective physical and also psychological examinations where problems can be identified? Who protects these children from their own ambitions, their parents' ambitions and their coach's demands?
I don't want to talk much about eating disorders, I think that was widely discussed among fans, skaters and officials. But when I researched for this I found several very interesting studies, that dealt with not overly discussed questions. The first one fits very nicely - it describes how children are influenced by their sport and by the physical ideal that sport represents.
The study divided a group of girls into three groups: no sports, non-aesthetic sports (softball, volleyball etc.) and aesthetic sports (among others of course figure skating). The girls were questioned at the age of 5 and 7 (!).
Girls in the aesthetic sport group reported higher weight concerns than girls in the nonaesthetic and no sport groups at ages 5 and 7 years. In addition, girls participating in aesthetic sports at ages 5 and 7 years reported the highest weight concerns at age 7.
Int J Eat Disord. 2002 Apr;31(3):312-7. Participation in aesthetic sports and girls' weight concerns at ages 5 and 7 years
Even at such a young age girls are profoundly influenced by the physical ideal - and no girl at this age should worry about weight. And the better and more competitive the girl is - the more she will be affected by physical changes. How are these girls feeling when they start to look like a young woman? Caroline Zhang has beaten the American National Champion at the GPF and at Nationals - how will her relationship to her body change if the body starts "betraying" her? The better the girl was before she became a young woman - the harder it will be to adapt to the changes. Another study examined junior elite skaters and concentrated on self-perception etc.
Younger, premenarcheal, ectomorphic skaters reporting lower social physique anxiety were more satisfied with their body fat and sport competence but reported lower self-esteem, global physical self-concept, and appearance scores. Skating context did not predict physical self-perceptions.
ResQ Exerc Sport. 2006 Jun;77(2):158-66. Puberty and physical self-perceptions of competitive female figure skaters: an interdisciplinary approach
Interesting is here the last sentence: it didn't matter how good / bad they were as skaters - the physical self-perception was defined by weight and body type.
And one last study that practically says that elite figure skaters are on a diet even if they are completely satisfied with weight and appearance. One of the reasons could be that after years and years of weight concerns (even 5 year old girls know the drill) these athletes are used to eating not enough and it becomes their second nature.
Data suggested that these athletes dieted despite relative satisfaction with body image. Although biochemical measures of nutritional status were all within normal range, inadequate energy intakes and delayed menarche (in women) were widespread in this athlete sample.
Int J Eat Disord. 1998 Dec;24(4):421-7 Body image and dieting behaviors among elite figure skaters
Other psychological concerns
Figure skaters are often young athletes involved in an extremely stressful, structured environment that is focused solely on skating. These athletes are at risk for a multitude of psychologic concerns, including poor communication skills, performance anxiety, stress, and family issues. Helping athletes develop self-awareness, techniques to control stress and anxiety, motivational strategies, ability to maintain concentration, and emotional balance is best done with the guidance of a sports-trained counseling professional. Communication among the athlete, parents, and coaches is extremely important. Often, coaches tell the athlete how and what to feel, and the athlete falls into a routine of trying to please coaches and parents instead of developing her own persona.
Clin Sports Med. 2000 Apr;19(2):369-80. Injuries and special concerns of female figure skaters
This small abstract describes nicely the major psychological problems a young athlete can face while persuing her skating career and focuses on the everyday problems that ocur if someone lives in an artificial enviroment. Apart from the most prominent problems (injuries and eating disorders) high performing child-athletes face minor problems e.g. fatigue.
Two case studies about 11-year-old skiers show that fatigue is a common problem among young athletes that needs to be analysed and confronted. Fatigue includes decreased level of performance and sleeping disorders - the article recommends regular examinations to avoid these problems.
Ann Readapt Med Phys. 2007 Nov;50(8):690-4, 685-9. Epub 2007 Jun 26.Use of the fatigue questionnaire (QFES) in child athletes for individual follow-up: two cases.
Another study mentions that
As a whole, practising sports as an elite student-athlete can be considered as correlated negatively with cigarette, alcohol and cannabis use. Nevertheless, this relationship depends on the kind of sport practised as well as the level of competition, and further research is needed to understand specific elite athletes' motives for use.
Addiction. 2003 Sep;98(9):1249-56. Sporting activity and drug use: Alcohol, cigarette and cannabis use among elite student athletes.
"The level of competition" is interesting here, the author refers to the fact that
"Girls who entered competition at international level were more prone to smoke cigarettes and cannabis" than all the other Elite Student Athletes. That can prove again that the level of competition matters.
With respect to the consequences of stress, mounting evidence suggests that a significant number of young athletes experience adverse psychological, behavioral, and health-related effects. In fact, because of anticipated stresses, some children decline to participate in the first place. Competitive stress detracts from enjoyment of sports, causes performance impairment, and contributes significantly to the drop-out rate in youth sports. Evidence also indicates that competitive stress can cause loss of sleep and put youngsters at greater risk for sustaining athletic injuries.
Pediatr Clin North Am 1990 Oct; 37(5):1021-46 Psychology of the young athlete. Stress-related maladies and remedial approaches.
This is an abstract from an article describes mostly the consequences of competitive stress that is significant - even for young children. When I watch YouTubes from young Mao or now Mirai Nagasu - the commentators often say that these youngsters are so fearless, and that's correct! These young skaters are more fearless!
Regarding the degree of anxiety, no significant difference was found between the competition and the training session. Cortisol levels did not change during the training session: during the competition, same moderate increase (less than 50%, P < 0.05) was noted for the first two rounds between rest and post-competition values. No difference was found at the third round. CONCLUSION: The high levels of stress described in adults are not found in young tennis players.
Arch Pediatr. 1997 Mar;4(3):237-42.[Is a 11-year-old tennis player indifferent to competition stress?]
So - no competitive stress for young skaters? Well no, the study focussed on the stress level during the competition - psychosocial stress, the long-term effects are not measured and as described in this long, long, long post they are the significant ones. I just enjoyed the fact that there is a physiological reason for the fact that athletes before puberty appear so fearless.
Conclusion
No, I won't write a real one. But after mentioning mostly psychological and medical concerns I want to hint at the ethical aspects of children performing in high-performance sports. There is a thing called
“Achievement by Proxy Distortion (ABPD)” - it says that parents try to live through their children. The most extreme form is abuse, children who are forced into extreme training regimens are in fact abused. If a young skater is payed for skating in a show - the money will be the parents' money. That is a civilised form of child labour.
In the extreme, when family life comes to revolve around one child's training and athletic success, everyone suffers. Siblings feel ignored, the high achieving child becomes a commodity, and ultimately roles are reversed: the child is nurturing and supporting the adults' needs. When it gets to this point, coaches, institutions, sponsors, etc., collude with parents; though it's hard to prove and prosecute, many believe this constitutes a form of child abuse.
Youth Sports
The age requirement for figure skating and gymnastics will not prevent parents from abusing their children, it will not prevent children from becoming high-performing athletes - but at least it doesn't encourage it. The lower the age requirement (e.g. 12 or 13) the earlier the children will be encouraged to start extreme training.
Excellent thoughts concerning child athletes offers this book:
Sport, Civil Liberties and Human Rights
ITA.
