Determinants of Sport Participation Among Canadian Adolescents

This paper explores adolescent sport participation. Using the most recently available national statistics, the paper presents a concise and current description of sport participation among Canadian adolescents aged 15 to 19; traces the trends in Canadian adolescent participation from 1992 to 2005 and identifies some of the most important correlates of participation for this age category. Using the qualitative method of netnography, the paper then considers the meaning and role of these core factors in the sport behaviours of adolescents as revealed in online narratives. This study’s quantitative findings highlight the impact of household context, gender, community context, self-perceptions and competing behaviours on sport participation. The netnography articulates a complicated picture of stress, social role conflict and susceptibility to external influence. The results suggest that research and managerial effort should be expended to develop targeted programs that use the household as the unit of analysis and that “position” sport within the context of the lived experiences of today’s adolescents. This means fitting sport into the time-challenged, gender-stereotyped, highly-technologised, cyber-filled lives of today’s youth.