1

Effects of
mediated sports on
Boys 12-14
5/2/16
Marquise Watson

Professor Baran
Com 460

This study I did will involve many things that I have researched. After tons
and tons of research and a semester long study there is one common theme with
athletes make a much money as possible and anybody that tries to stop you from
that have to go. Sports and Negative Effects they have on boys 12-14. Playing
sports and the effects of playing and not getting in the game bench players not
being accepted in society. Research Masculinity in sports and how hard it is to
make a man. Creating a new breed of men in America and the world perspective
changing Going to college or not depending on if you play sports. Athletes are seen
as above the law. Also an interview with a coach and a NFL player will be included
on top of all the other research that was done.
Questions that I explored during my research was what are boys 12-14
doing? Why is sports such a big part of their life? Who are they looking up to?
What are they wearing? What are their views on females? These are questions are
whats shaping our youth culture and its the athletes and the things they do that are
help either shape this or deform this. EVERYONE is watching to everyone.
Getting people to stop watching to just be not going to happen. What are they
watching?
According to Federal Communications Commission a person watches at least 2
sporting events week. What young boys see on to is what they want to do. Parents

are watching to more than they ever have too and then using the two to raise their
children. What are they watching reality TV shows, cartoons and Sports? But the
most watched thing on TV is sports mediated sports control how we think act and
believe people should be or the lives they should live. Adults are watching sports
which leads to children watching sports. Now not everything about sports is bad
(teamwork, competitions, hard work, leadership and all the tools that help build
character. But is that the only way to build character or to become a great leader
you have to play sports? The only way to be a tough man is playing sports? NO,
this is not the case at all but in boys 12-14 this image gets put in their head when
they are young and they get told to be the man in high school. Boys 12-14 think
playing sports means being cool
Sports stars teach kids how to dress, act, think and ultimately have more influence
than some parents. College is soon to be to the equivalency of what a high school
diploma was about 20 years ago. Every Day College is getting more expensive and
harder to get into Kids when they 12-14 and the college affect is becoming real. 85
% of young boys get told right away your playing a sport if you want to go to
college, No substance behind that. Parents put them hats on kids making it to the
highest level or sports but they back up plan is so nonexistent, Not all parents make
it like that. America college tuitions is sky rocking so it leaves kids only to get
finical aid or apply scholarships and they feel the pressure to get athletic

scholarships. Even on college applications they want to know what sports you
played what you did extra. Dreams of multimillion-dollar contracts, Olympic glory
and college scholarships have many parents pushing their children harder than ever
to play sports. Kids are being entered in sports leagues at younger ages; some are
forced to participate year-round in the hopes of creating the next superstar.
Involving your child in sports has many positive benefits. However, pushing
children into playing sports can negatively impact their emotional development
and damage the parent-child bond.
Parents generally are the worst judges of their childs ability. The emotional
investment clouds judgment and blinds parents from seeing that their child may not
be gifted in sports. Instead of identifying this lack of ability, some parents push
harder and end up pushing the child too far. When children lack ability but are
forced to compete, they are placed in humiliating situations where they continually
fail. Instead of cultivating healthy self-esteem from sports participation, the
repeated embarrassment can cause the child to become stressed, anxious,
withdrawn and depressed. The child also may develop a negative sense of self due
to the poor performances, instead of looking to character traits, actions and other
abilities to build healthy self-esteem.

The age at which boys start playing tackle football may have a big impact on brain
health later in life, a new study suggests.
Former NFL players who started playing tackle football before the age of 12 were
at a higher risk of altered brain development compared to those who stared later in
life, according to the study published in the Journal of Neurotrauma. "Participation
in sports can have so many important benefits, including development of
leadership and social skills, not to mention health benefits," Stern said. "Our goal
from this study and our other research is to make sure children can take advantage
of all those benefits without the risk of long term health benefits."
The researchers focused on a large brain structure called the corpus callosum.
"The corpus callosum can be seen as a super highway that connects the left and
right hemispheres of the brain," Stern said.
The new study follows closely on the heels of another report by the same
researchers showing that NFL players who started playing tackle football before
age 12 showed greater declines in memory and cognitive functioning compared to
peers who started later.

The study adds to the mounting evidence that developing brains are more
vulnerable to repeated hits, said study coauthor Robert Stern, a professor of
neurology, neurosurgery, and anatomy and neurobiology at the Boston University
School of Medicine. Stern is also director of the Clinical Core of the Alzheimer's
disease and CTE Center.
There are many negative effects on boys playing sports. Boys from 12-14 are
becoming depressed at alarming rate Hockey, football, and boxing and sports like
these are making kids very aggressive. They do not know how to turn that
aggression off when they get hurt of its no longer there season ends. We have
nothing for these kids to do after sports or when season is over. Dr Hak Hayden
youth mentor for boys and girls clubs across America quoted America pushes
sports and tries to forces kids to participate why we must use sports for exercise.
The masculinity inside mediated sports. On Real sports Hbo show a Famous
football coach once quote by saying Football is our last hope to create tough
men. If you do not play sports you are seen as less of a man in society and even if
you play sports and you do not get in the game thats just as bad you cant be just
part of the team you got to play. What message are sending children or young teens
if we tell them hey if you do not get in the game you not as good Johnny who did.
America glorifies the athlete that celebrates when he scores the touchdown but the
not the person who helped him read. Teachers, Professors and mentors are not

recognized .Family problems are becoming more and more relevant and bring
more issues then we need. Instead of going to talk to mommy or daddy about day
to day problems Boys are going to espn or their twitter to express their problems.
They see their favorite superstar tweeting about problems talking about problems
so they think they can do the same. Star athletes such as Greg Hardy who was on
espn for a month beat on females and did not get penalized for what he did that
teaches a bad lesson to young boys. We have been known as reward those who
degrade women and honor them. That makes no sense and the TV is promoting
this.
Two reports has been conducted by the NFL and a team of outside doctors. Both
reports included data from former NFL players who were part of a larger study,
dubbed DETECT. That study was designed to find ways to diagnose chronic
traumatic encephalopathy a degenerative brain disease that has been linked to
repeated jolts to the head in living patients. To be eligible for DETECT,
participants had to have already begun to have problems with thinking and/or
memory. All the men in the new study had played organized football for more than
12 years. ike the game itself, The United States of Football is, in turns, exciting,
stimulating, and heartbreaking. Theres no other word but that last one to describe
what too many hits to the head did to the late, great Baltimore Colts Hall of Fame
tight end John Mackey: In 2000, when he was just 59, he became the first NFL

player to be diagnosed with frontal temporal dementia. In Pamphilons film,

Mackeys wife Sylvia feeds him, constantly calling to him John Mackey!
because, she says, I dont want him to forget his name. The United States of
Football also tells the story of Dave Duerson, an 11-year veteran, most notably of
the 1985 Chicago Bears Super Bowl champions, who shot himself in the chest in
2011 at age 50. Neurologists later confirmed that Duerson suffered from a
neurodegenerative disease linked to concussions.
The former players' brains were scanned using a type of imaging known as
Diffusor Tensor Imaging (DTI), which looks at the health of the nerve cells'
communication cables, called axons. For axons to work efficiently, they must have
an intact outer covering, just as an electrical wire needs to have insulation around
it.

Sports also have a bad way of teaching youth boys to become quitters The Sport in
America research found that for more than 80 percent of respondents, having fun is
the most common reason for initially becoming involved in sport. Conversely,
when sport is no longer fun, children and youth are more likely to stop
participating. The quality of our engagement in sport influences our sense of fun.
Several researchers have tried to get behind this concept of fun. Just what does it

mean? Some studies have linked the concept of fun to developing a sense of
competency, becoming socially involved, building friendships, receiving
psychosocial support, and feeling mastery over ones body. Sport can be a critical
aspect of childhood development if taught, organized, managed, and led in a
manner consistent with sound developmental principles Many researchers and
professors and psychologists gave insights into sport skill development stress the
importance of not pressuring children to compete at levels beyond their
developmental capacity. Alot work done also emphasizes the fact that children
develop skills in a sequential pattern that is unique to them. Development is age
related but not age dependent. Cognition, perceptions, behaviors, and motor skills
progress at different speeds in children, which means that parents and coaches need
to recognize a childs developmental stage. Both early and late bloomers are found
within a given age range, and tremendous growth can occur within a 12-month
period. This makes birth date cutoffs for preadolescent teams even more difficult to
manage, with some players having significant physical and developmental
advantages over others. This relative age effect can have lasting effects. In fact,
researchers who study the relative age effect in sport have found that, within a
given cohort, individuals who are relatively older tend to be over-represented at
elite levels within sport, particularly in hockey, soccer, and baseball.

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Numerous research studies show that children, even in early adolescence, do not
need to be competent in their sport to benefit psychologically from participating in
it. Thus, the structure and expectations for the quality of the play should be
considered as much as the quantity of play.
Some children who are late bloomers never catch up as they lose confidence,
playing time, and even roster slots to more developed peers. These early lost
opportunities can cause lasting harm. Playing sport is often seen as a determinant
of social status and acceptance, especially among boys. Early bloomers benefit
from positive reinforcement and encouragement, while the late bloomers might be
accused of not trying hard enough when in fact, they are doing the best that they
can.
Children in sport and observed that they do not even develop a mature
understanding of competition until they reach age 12. Anyone who watches young
children play sport has seen the girl in the outfield picking clover, the basketball
player running the wrong way with the ball, or all players from both teams chasing
a soccer ball in a herd. These behaviors are developmentally normal. Forcing sixand seven-year-olds to hold their positions, work harder, and pay attention is not
consistent with their developmental capacity. Getting frustrated with them only
makes things worse, because they are unlikely to understand the source of the
frustration. Suddenly, this play is no longer fun.

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Team-Up for Youth recommends that schools and communities consider certain
options when working with youth of different ages and developmental stages. At
the middle and high school level where children begin dropping out of sport
programs should be available for freshman and junior varsity teams to ensure
continuity in playing experience for those not experienced enough for varsity sport.
Second, programs should provide opportunities for nontraditional and club sport
for those who want to start playing a sport in high school but who are not skilled
enough to play at the varsity level. There should be a place for anyone who wants
to play sport. It should be inclusive, not exclusive.

In conclusion the purpose of my research was to develop more questions? Why

arent their more after school programs for Boys 12-14.Why arent the schools
educating them on how to handle themselves on social media and in a public
setting? What can we do to make teacher, mentors, and parents have more of a
bigger role? What will it take for athletes to understand just giving a check back to
their local organization is not enough? We need have social media classes in the
classroom or ways to show how athletes should handle themselves .Athletes who
have made mistakes need to come to the school spend time with them and promote
more education things instead of just sports. Athletes need to be governed much
better and portray a better image for the youth. Big brother big sisters program

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need to more useful and not just for kids of special needs, extreme finical
circumstances or at risk kids. All boys 12-14 need to be targeted.

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