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Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level

Sport researchers have warned about the lack of a clear and consistent definition of early specialization, while others have raised concerns around the validity of methods used to classify athletes as ‘specializers’. The current investigation includes two studies examining the implications of varyin...

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Autores principales: Mosher, Alexandra, Fraser-Thomas, Jessica, Wilson, Melissa J., Baker, Joseph
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8954525/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35324644
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/sports10030034
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author Mosher, Alexandra
Fraser-Thomas, Jessica
Wilson, Melissa J.
Baker, Joseph
author_facet Mosher, Alexandra
Fraser-Thomas, Jessica
Wilson, Melissa J.
Baker, Joseph
author_sort Mosher, Alexandra
collection PubMed
description Sport researchers have warned about the lack of a clear and consistent definition of early specialization, while others have raised concerns around the validity of methods used to classify athletes as ‘specializers’. The current investigation includes two studies examining the implications of varying classification methods for exploring both specialization and early specialization in sport. Study 1 examined whether different approaches to defining and measuring specialization affected the classification of athletes throughout development and provided a ‘profile’ of the sample in terms of developmental milestones related to specialization. Results indicated the proportion of athletes classified as specializers varied depending on the method used and athletes generally met specialization milestones after the age of 12. Study 2 examined the proportions of athletes who achieved ‘elite’, ‘pre-elite’, and ‘non-elite’ status in adulthood who were early specializers as determined by different methods. Results showed the method used changed the proportion of athletes classified as specializers at each level and there was no clear advantage or disadvantage to being a specializer. Combined, these studies provide intriguing data regarding the implications of different measures for assessing specialization in young athletes.
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spelling pubmed-89545252022-03-26 Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level Mosher, Alexandra Fraser-Thomas, Jessica Wilson, Melissa J. Baker, Joseph Sports (Basel) Article Sport researchers have warned about the lack of a clear and consistent definition of early specialization, while others have raised concerns around the validity of methods used to classify athletes as ‘specializers’. The current investigation includes two studies examining the implications of varying classification methods for exploring both specialization and early specialization in sport. Study 1 examined whether different approaches to defining and measuring specialization affected the classification of athletes throughout development and provided a ‘profile’ of the sample in terms of developmental milestones related to specialization. Results indicated the proportion of athletes classified as specializers varied depending on the method used and athletes generally met specialization milestones after the age of 12. Study 2 examined the proportions of athletes who achieved ‘elite’, ‘pre-elite’, and ‘non-elite’ status in adulthood who were early specializers as determined by different methods. Results showed the method used changed the proportion of athletes classified as specializers at each level and there was no clear advantage or disadvantage to being a specializer. Combined, these studies provide intriguing data regarding the implications of different measures for assessing specialization in young athletes. MDPI 2022-02-28 /pmc/articles/PMC8954525/ /pubmed/35324644 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/sports10030034 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Mosher, Alexandra
Fraser-Thomas, Jessica
Wilson, Melissa J.
Baker, Joseph
Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title_full Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title_fullStr Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title_full_unstemmed Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title_short Proportions of Early Specializers Varies According to Methods and Skill Level
title_sort proportions of early specializers varies according to methods and skill level
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8954525/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35324644
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/sports10030034
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AT bakerjoseph proportionsofearlyspecializersvariesaccordingtomethodsandskilllevel