There is a debate of whether early specialization in sport is the most beneficial way to turn young athletes into elite athletes as adults. Although there is evidence to support the correlation of quantity of hours trained and success levels, early specialization can pose many negative consequences. These consequences can include burnout, staleness, and a lack of social growth which may lead to social isolation. According to Joseph Baker (2003), from his paper on Early Specialization in Youth Sport: a requirment for adult expertise? he states, "perhaps the most damaging evidence against advocating the early specialization approach concerns sport dropout. Investigations of participants who drop out of sport have consistently indicated that lack of fun or enjoyment is a predominant motive for discontinuing participation in a given sport." I think anyone who has grown up playing sports has experianced or seen drop out happen. Whether it is because of a loss of interest, pressure from social factors (i.e. parents) or lack of enjoyment, it happens in every sport in various situations.
Baker (2003) proposed that, "diversified involvement in a number of sports during early stages of development has been presented as a possible alternative to early specialization." Diversified involvement involves children exploring various sports and activities to develop fundamental motor sills rather then the idea of specialization at an early age where the child only focuses on developing the skills directly to one specific sport. I believe the idea of diversified involvement is very important as between the ages of nine and twelve is one of the most crucial time periods for children to develop fundamental motor skills. These fundamental skills include jumping, hopping, bounding, running and throwing. These introduce the ABC's of athleticism, which are agility, balance, coordination and speed. All these skills need to be developed before a child specializes in order to set the foundation to be a successful atlete. "In a recent study of expert decision makers from the sports of basketball, netball and field hocket, Baker et al. (2003) indicated that participation in other relevant activites (e.g. other sports where dynamic decision-making is necessary) during early phases of development augmented the physical and cognitive skills necessary in their primary sport (Baker, 2003).
I took a coaching class at the University of Alberta that consisted all of either varisity athletes, or individuals that grew up playing sports at a competitve level. 60% of the students said they participated in more then three sports or leisure activites before the age of 12, myself included. Now in no way would I define myself as an elite athlete. On average I spend ten hours a week during my varsity soccer season training, practicing and competing. But having said that I would consider myself just below an elite athlete that has achieved success competing at a high level. Although I started soccer at a young age I did not start specializing until the age of 14. This was after I was able to experiance years of dance, gymnastics, swimming, volleyball, and a few other team sports. Being able to generalize and experiment with these various sports allowed me to develop my fundamental motor skills which has greatly contributed to my success as an athlete today.
"Barynina and Vaisekhovsii's (1992) study of elite swimmers indicated that athletes who specialized early spent less time on the national team and ended their sports careers earlier than athletes who specialized later (Baker, 2003)." I am interested to see what the statistics are for elite athletes and in particular the World Cup players in terms of whether they took the path of early specialization or diversificarion as these professionals are considered some of the most elite athletes in the world in my opinion.
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