Volunteers needed for a study into injury and athlete mental health
By Catherine Wheatley
The tackle that condemned Ethan, 17, to months on crutches happened right in front of me. It was a freezing Sunday morning, and I was watching my son and his friends playing in a mid-league football match against local rivals. Ethan’s dad was videoing him for his A-Level PE non-exam assessment, and we didn’t need a replay to guess that the collision had ruptured Ethan’s ACL. Ethan never came back to the team. In the end he waited over a year for surgery, and he had to switch to a coaching activity for his non-exam assessment. I never saw Ethan again, but I heard that the following months proved challenging: physically, socially and academically.
Sport and physical activity are good for health, fitness and mental wellbeing: this is well-known and clearly set out in PE theory curricula. Too few young people meet physical activity guidelines, so ‘move more’ is the fundamental public health message. Overall – at population level – participation benefits far outweigh risks, so it’s no surprise that injury impact is not foregrounded in PE teaching specifications or in coaching courses.
Yet for individual pupils like Ethan, injuries can be catastrophic. Aside from the physical consequences, injuries are among the most frequent reasons young people give for dropping out of sport completely[i]. Less obvious, but also challenging, are the mental impacts, which can include frustration, loneliness and fear of re-injury. Many young people speak of injury robbing them of their sense of ‘self’ and their identity as a footballer or dancer, for example[ii].
While we should not encourage students to characterise perfectly normal – if distressing – worries or low moods as clinical anxiety or depression, we should also recognise that these adolescent feelings can be difficult and can lead to challenging behaviour. Among more vulnerable students, they could be risk factors for developing mental ill health.[iii]
Primary injury prevention strategies – preventing injuries before they happen with warm-ups, good technique, appropriate equipment, hydration and rest, for example – are all covered in the GCSE PE specification. But not all injuries are preventable, and when they do happen, we need to know what to do. Physical repair and rehab, guided by doctors and physios, are the primary treatments. But mental factors may need attention too, and here we can help.
Podium Analytics is developing evidence-based support and coping strategies through its Young Voices in Sport project, a research and resource development programme designed with input from teachers, coaches and young people themselves. We are running a study with the University of Bath to explore the mental impact of injury and how these are influenced by home, school and sport environments. The information we collect from young people will help us produce information and guidance for coping with, and thriving after, injury.
Some of the building blocks for teaching the importance of mental support post-injury are already embedded in PE theory curricula. The social and emotional wellbeing benefits of sport and physical activity represent some of the costs of being sidelined. But could there be scope for more information, to help pupils like Ethan?
How you can get involved
Podium would love to hear your feedback on our plans to develop brief resources on the mental impact of injury for PE teachers and coaches. What can we do to make these useful and effective?
We still need a few more young people (aged 16-18) with recent sports injuries to take part in our study, to make sure we represent a diverse range of experiences. Please share study details!
To find out more about the study and what it involves, click here
Catherine Wheatley is a health psychologist, journalist and author with a background in academic research. She has a PhD in behavioural science, with a focus on physical activity for mental health. She is the mental health and wellbeing programme manager at Podium Analytics, a sports injury prevention charity. [email protected]
References
[i] Crane, J., & Temple, V. (2015). A systematic review of dropout from organized sport among children and youth. European physical education review, 21(1), 114-131.
[ii] Haraldsdottir, K., & Watson, A. M. (2021). Psychosocial impacts of sports-related injuries in adolescent athletes. Current sports medicine reports, 20(2), 104-108.
[iii] Putukian, M. (2016). The psychological response to injury in student athletes: a narrative review with a focus on mental health. British journal of sports medicine, 50(3), 145-148.
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