Structural and individual factors of sports participation of youth – a comparison between German and French-speaking municipalities in Switzerland

Nagel, Siegfried; Hayoz, Christelle; Klostermann, Claudia; Schlesinger, Torsten (June 2017). Structural and individual factors of sports participation of youth – a comparison between German and French-speaking municipalities in Switzerland. In: Slepičková, Irena (ed.) The Values of Sport: Between tradition and (post)modernity. 14th European Association for Sociology of Sport Conference. Abstractband. Prag. 14.-17.06.2017.

Sports participation differs considerably depending on the linguistic region in Switzerland. The German-speaking population shows a higher sports activity than French or Italian-speaking citizens (Lamprecht, Fischer, & Stamm, 2014). This study analyses how different structural conditions in the municipalities and sports-related orientations of individuals across the German and French-speaking regions of Switzerland correlate with sports participation of adolescents and young adults. In order to identify possible structural factors, municipal sports leaders (n = 36) in German and French-speaking municipalities were surveyed. In addition, sports providers (n = 294) completed an online questionnaire about their sports offer. Individual factors pertaining to adolescents and young adults, were collected through an online survey of the 15- to 30-year-old population (N = 4'039, Mage = 21.5, SDage = 4.64). Sports participation is significantly higher in German-speaking municipalities (84%) compared to French-speaking municipalities (76.2%) (χ2 (1, N = 4039) = 33.058, p< .001). Moreover, adolescents and young adults of French-speaking municipalities are less satisfied with the local sports offer (t(3058)= 6.386, p< .001) and the sports infrastructure (t(3218) = 7.104, p< .001). Inhabitants of German-speaking municipalities give more importance to their body appearance (t(3700) = 7.124, p< .05) and are less ashamed for their bodies during sports activities (t(3691) = -5.098., p < .05). These findings show that structural conditions in municipalities as well as the youth's individual perception and individual sports-related orientations may be relevant for the sports participation of adolescents and young adults.

Item Type:

Conference or Workshop Item (Abstract)

Division/Institute:

07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Sport Science (ISPW)
07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Sport Science (ISPW) > Sport Sociology and Management

UniBE Contributor:

Nagel, Siegfried, Hayoz, Christelle Vanessa, Klostermann, Claudia, Schlesinger, Torsten

Subjects:

300 Social sciences, sociology & anthropology
700 Arts > 790 Sports, games & entertainment

ISBN:

978-80-87647-36-3

Language:

English

Submitter:

Siegfried Nagel

Date Deposited:

06 Mar 2018 13:21

Last Modified:

05 Dec 2022 15:08

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/108327

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