Sea-quark effects in the pion charge form factor

It is shown that the data on the pion charge form factor admit the possibility for a substantial sea-quark component in the pion wave function. If the charge form factor is calculated with instant form kinematics in a constituent quark model that is extended to include explicit (q (q) over bar)(2) components in the pion wave function, that component will give the dominant contribution to the calculated pi(+) charge form factor at large values of momentum transfer. The present experimental values Q(2) can be described fairly well with (q (q) over bar)(2) component admixtures of up to 50%. The sensitivity of the calculated pi(+) charge form factor to whether one of the quarks or one of the antiquarks is taken to be in the P state is small.