The role of theory in researching sports development

1. The role of theory in researching sports development It’s not what you do but the way that you do it The price of everything and the value of nothing Studying Sports Development Brunel University 25-25 April 2006 Prof Fred Coalter University of Stirling

2. Playing on everybody's team “ Arts, sport and leisure activities….have a role to play in countering Social Exclusion. They can help to increase the self-esteem of individuals; build community spirit; increase social interaction; improve health and fitness; create employment and give young people a purposeful activity, reducing the temptation to anti-social behaviour.” Social Inclusion Strategy (Scottish Office, 1999) “ Sport can contribute to neighbourhood renewal by improving communities’ performance on four key indicators - health, crime, employment and education.” Policy Action Group 10 (DCMS, 1999) Sports development is a surprisingly difficult term to define Houlihan and White

3. It’s got the whole world in its hands Louise Fréchette, the UN Deputy Secretary General. World Sport’s Forum March 2000 “The power of sports is far more than symbolic. You are engines of economic growth. You are a force for gender equality. You can bring youth and others in from the margins, strengthening the social fabric. You can promote communication and help heal the divisions between peoples, communities and entire nations. You can set an example of fair play. Last but not least, you can advocate a strong and effective United Nations.”

4. Going beyond the touch line 2005: UN Year of Sport and Physical Education, collaborated with organisations in the commercial, public and voluntary sectors “what was missing, however, was a systematic approach to an important sector in civil society: sport …. the United Nations is turning to the world of sport for help in the work for peace and the effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goals”. • Universal primary education • Promoting gender equality/empowering women • Combating HIV/AIDS • Addressing issues of environmental sustainability Plus Sport  Sport plus

5. Sport-in-Development Sport or sport plus? Liberia: post war conflict resolution Senegal: rural Muslim communities South Africa: peer leader training Malawi: street children and re-integration Uganda 1: HIV/AIDS Uganda 2: refugees Tanzania: HIV/AIDS and female empowerment Mumbai: slum and street children Calcutta: railway children

6. It’s more than a game Beyond participation Inputs  Outputs  Sporting inclusion Traditional SD: Equity  Sporting Outcomes Skills, rules, ethics Direct  Intervening Confounding   Indirect  Intermediate impacts Personal/social development/attitudes  Intermediate outcomes Behaviour  Strategic outcomes Community regeneration/social capital Conflict resolution

7. Nobody knows the score…….. Collins et al (1999) Only 11 studies had "anything approaching rigorous evaluations and some of these did not give specific data for excluded groups or communities". Witt and Crompton (1996) Review of 120 programmes for at-risk youth: 30% had no evaluation Only 4% had pre/post evaluation of participation-related changes …….or the rules! “.. a widespread lack of empirical research on outcomes, and more importantly, the mechanisms and processes via which they are achieved (especially in 'real life‘ situations)” Coalter et al (2000) Sport lacks a robust evidence base to support its case for continued and increased levels of public funding. Game Plan (2002)

8. “Ill-defined interventions with hard to follow outcomes” Conceptual weaknesses (1) Sport; participation; frequency; anti-social behaviour Conceptual weakness (2) Causes of crime, educational under-achievement, lack of social cohesion Methodological weaknesses Cross-sectional; lack of controls; self-selection Little consideration of sufficient conditions Process; experience the clearest call for TBE comes when prior evaluations show inconsistent results Weiss (1997)

9. Sports evangelism • Mythopoeic nature of sport • Popular/idealistic ideas produced outside sociological analysis • Relationships between some variables to exclusion of others • Vague/generalised images, elements of truth  reified/distorted • ‘represent’ not reflect reality : ad hominem ‘evidence’ • Stand for supposed, but unexamined, impacts/processes • Concepts whose demarcation criteria are not specific: ‘sport’? ‘intriguingly vague and open for several interpretations’ Kruse • Political/professional/commonsense ‘repertoires/’tacit knowledge’ • Inflated promises  funding/status/political advantage • Theoretical / hypothetical coherence  assume outcomes

10. Sport as a magic box  Sport  • ‘Sport’ presumed to have causal powers •  Closed system: medical/treatment model: social vaccine • Search for the ‘killer fact’/empirical generalisation: “Sport can…. • Outputs/ outcomes emphasised  ‘heterogeneous replication’ • Issues ignored/downplayed • Conditionality [weak to moderate; cross-sectional; self-report; • direction of cause; confounding variables] Cultural context  Validity: comparing the same thing? Process/mechanisms: how/why?sufficient conditions

11. A Question of Sport Fire, steady, aim “ ….there is nothing about …sport itself that is magical….It is the experience of sport that may facilitate the result”. Papacharisisi et al (2005) Patriksson (1998) “The futility of arguing whether sport is good or bad has been observed by several authors. Sport, like most activities, is not a priori good or bad, but has the potential of producing both positive or negative outcomes. Questions like ‘what conditions are necessary for sport to have beneficial outcomes?’ must be asked more often”.

12. Playing in mid-field      Sports evangelism  middle range theory  Mechanisms, processes, networks and ‘purposive action’ • ‘Generative approach’ to causation • Not ‘sport’  underlying resources/process is all • Families of programmes  families of mechanisms • Causation is contingent/interactive/not guaranteed • Theory underpinning programme  generalisation Understanding causes/solutions and managing for outcomes? • Understanding process precedes definition of possible outcomes • Outcome measurement without process: limited explanatory value

13. So, what is this game? Structural/process propertiesPresumed outcomes Direct effects Indirect outcomes • Physical fitness/health • Mental health/psychological well-being Anxiety/ stress  Personality/psychological development Self-efficacy/confidence/self-esteem/ locus of control Employability  Reduced Crime Education Drug use • Socio-psychological Empathy/tolerance/co-operation/social skills   Social cohesion Social capital  Sociological Community identity/coherence/ integration Necessary condition sufficient conditions

14. It’s more than just balls SportS: Processes relationships learning outcomes Individual Partner Team Strategy Physical Skills Cognitive Motor Contact Non-Contact Criterion Norm Competitive Recreational Which sports, which outcomes for which individual/groups?

15. It’s more than a game Beyond participation        ‘Research free zone’ Inputs  Outputs  Sporting inclusion Traditional SD: Equity  Sporting Outcomes Skills, rules, ethics  Theory of change Theory of change Theory of change  Intermediate impacts Personal/social development/attitudes  Intermediate outcomes Behaviour  Strategic outcomes Community regeneration/social capital Conflict resolution Sport plus?

16. Relationship between strategy and tactics? • Programmes are theories  Logic models • Outline core theories: how is programme supposed to work? • Interrogate: is basic plan sound/plausible/practical/valid? Reveal assumptions ‘Causes and ‘cures’  Illustrate connections Programme components/expected outcomes ‘sufficient conditions’  Strengthen claims for causality Estimate difficult-to-measure programme effects ‘on the balance of probability’ “because so many programs have failed to show success, much program theory in undoubtedly wrong” Weiss

17. TBE : a two-way conversation Programme theories/logic theories of change  Basis for M&E • Properties/processes of participation that lead to such outcomes? • Relationship between participation and type of intermediate impacts? • How, to what extent, such changes will result in changed behaviours?   Research/theory • M&E as development • Decision-makers question/analyse assumptions/risks • Engages stakeholders in the planning and monitoring process

18. A Model /Theory of Sport, HIV/AIDS and Sexual Behaviour Change Develop sporting/leadership skills  Develop sporting/ethical attitudes [peer leaders]  Gender equity attitudes/behaviour  Develop self-efficacy/confidence  HIV/AIDS information [KAO/didactic]  Self-esteem[mostly peer leaders?]  Reduced risk-taking sexual behaviour Self-efficacy + attitudes + information  changed sexual behaviour …maybe

19. Sources of perceived self - efficacy Beliefs about capabilities to influence events that affect their lives. “If I can’t do a job first time, I keep on trying until I can” VERBAL PERSUASION PERFORMANCE SELF- EFFICACY IMITATION & MODELING PHYSIOLOGICAL AROUSAL

20. Social Climate and Self-Efficacy Not what you do…but how you do it

21. Sport and Anti-social Behaviour  What are causes of anti-social behaviour?  How/why can sport address these? • Boredom [opportunity-led crime] • Diversionary schemes • Differential association • Peer/criminal sub-cultures  new peers/role models      • Adolescent development needs • Catharsis/excitement/competition • Lack of self-discipline • Training/performance/deferred gratification • Educational failure:blocked aspirations/achievement/self-esteem • Achievement locus of control  sports programmes/processes

22. The problem with the Irish….. • Are the issues simply methodological? • Is the verdict simply “not proven”? • What are the nature/scope/scale of our claims? • Sport or sport plus or……..

23. ‘complex systems thrust amidst complex systems’ ‘We mount limited-focus programs to cope with broad-gauge problems. We devote limited resources to long-standing and stubborn problems. Above all we concentrate attention on changing the attitudes and behaviour of target groups without concomitant attention to the institutional structures and social arrangements that tend to keep them “target groups”’. Weiss (1993) Paradox of empowerment Mwaanga Empowerment Through Women’s Football

24. “Whose side are you on?!!” What game are we playing?

26. Sport and anti-social behaviour Inputs : resources: type of staff  Outputs: type of programmes Individual/partner/team  Process, interaction, relationships  Sporting Outcomes Frequency/intensity/adherence  Intermediate impacts Improvements in cognitive and social skills.     Reductions in impulsiveness and risk-taking behaviour      Raised self-efficacy/confidence and self-esteem  • Intermediate outcomes • Improvements in education and employment prospects • Reduced anti-social/criminal behaviour/drug taking •  •  Social outcomes Reduction in crime

27. 6 stone weakling meets 400 pound gorilla 

28. There are no killer facts ‘Hard scientific evidence’? ’Knowledge creep’ theory of the role of evaluation “Diffuse and undirected infiltration of research ideas into [decision-makers] understanding of the world…. few deliberate and targeted uses of findings from individual studies. Rather they absorbed the concepts and generalisations from many studies over extended periods of time and they integrated research ideas……..into their interpretation of events…..gradual sensitisation to the perspectives of social science” Weiss “Policy makers like stories and we need to understand ………”

29. Cost benefit or political benefit? “ a rational exercise that takes place in a political context” Carol Weiss • ‘ Evidence’ more plural than research • ‘ Tests of truth and utility’ • Professional repertoires : congruent or confronting • Politics of ‘doing something’ • Placating interest groups • Enhancing political/organisational influence • ‘getting money into sport’ • Professional/organisational interests •  marginal policy area: status anxiety/legitimacy Take off more important than landings?