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Running head: ATHLETES AND SELF-ESTEEM
The Relationship between self-esteem of females
and participation in college athletics
Kathryn C. Heinmiller
Michigan State University
Abstract
The ways in which athletic participation can affect student-athletes is an important concept to investigate for alignment with institutional mission and benefits to the student-athletes themselves. Female student-athletes and nonathletes from a large Division I institution in the Midwest will be tested on three different occasions using the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (SES) and the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventory (SEI). In addition a random sample of nonathletes from the same institution will be given the same surveys. It is expected that the female student-athlete’s self-esteem measures will be significantly higher than the female nonathlete’s self-esteem. There are certain limitations to this study that will be discussed in further detail.
Introduction
The role of intercollegiate athletics and its relevance to education has come into question as of late. It is assumed that students-athletes are recruited to colleges for their athletic ability and not their academic potential. Institutional mission statements do not seem to reflect the same standards that athletics provide to students. Administrators want to know how athletics align and what student-athletes gain from participating in athletics.
The focus on college athletes as an important population comes from the excessive spending colleges use and the heavy recruitment of Division I athletes that takes place in American higher education. Unlike other college students, student athletes face an additional set of complex demands, stresses and challenges that arise from their involvement in a competitive sport (Broughton & Neyer, 2001). The place of athletics for the female college student in American higher education and the spending of resources on a non-educational based activity at institutions needs to be studied.
Many studies have been conducted to assess the varied effects that participation in intercollegiate athletics may or may not have on students. One such effect that has been studied is that of self-esteem. A difficult aspect of this type of study stems from the inability of researchers to agree on a definition of self-esteem. Also, most of the previous research studies have focused on the benefits of intercollegiate athletics on male participants at a single institution. In this paper, the relationship between female’s participation in college athletics and self-esteem is going to be studied using Rosenberg’s 10-item Self-Esteem Scale and Coopersmith’s Self-Esteem Inventory.
Literature Review
There is a tendency in existing research to focus the impact of athletic participation for students in general rather than the particular impact it can have for different kinds of students and in different institutional contexts (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). The impact and outcomes of participating in college athletics is a topic that needs to be researched further for several reasons. One of the factors involved in this type of research is the question as to the contribution of intercollegiate athletic participation to an individual’s education and to the institutional mission (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). Also, Cornelius (1995) suggests that only sparse evidence exists for the positive effects that athletic participation has on student-athletes. Most research from this area has methodological flaws and a focus on antisocial consequences of participation (Cornelius, 1995).
Hood, Craig, and Ferguson (1992) researched freshman athletes in different sports and matched them with nonathletes and compared the academic achievement of both groups. Outcomes of this study indicate that student-athletes have lower records of high school achievement and academic aptitude test scores than do other undergraduates, and achieve lower University grade point averages than do other undergraduates (Hood, Craig & Ferguson, 1992). These finds call into question the benefits that athletics provide for student-athletes and the rest of the academic community. The role of intercollegiate athletics in American higher education and the effect on students who participate in certain highly emphasized sports have been subjects of a long-standing debate (Hood, Craig, & Ferguson, 1992).
Pascarella and Smart studied several educational outcomes associated with African American males and Caucasian males participation in intercollegiate athletics. Some of the outcomes studied were social involvement, academic achievement in college bachelor’s degree obtainment, occupational status and income in the early career, and political and civic values and measures of intellectual and social self-esteem nine years after the initial enrollment in college (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). These outcomes are of some interest because they suggest an educational importance for having athletics on college campuses.
There has been concern about the contribution of intercollegiate athletics to an individual’s education (Pascarella, Truckenmiller, & Nora, 1999). Traditional academic measures do not appear to accurately predict academic performance for minority students-athletes; this situation often leads to lower self-esteem among minority students and stereotyping of these athletes (Killeya, 2001). Being a student-athlete may be one way to improve upon the lower self-esteem that can sometimes occur in these minority students. Athletics may be one of the few successful ways for minority students to develop a sense of community (Killeya, 2001).
The research findings of Pascarella and Smart (1991) suggest that athletes are significantly more likely than nonathletes to have more positive social self-esteem, including leadership, nine years after initial enrollment in college. However, these findings come from research that only sampled male athletes. This implies the need for further research to examine the effects of athletic participation and female college athletes.
Many women who attend coeducational institutions have the perception of inequity in the environment, which can negatively impact the adjustment and achievement in college (Tomlinson-Clarke & Clarke, 1994). Having organizations that focus solely on female development can improve these characteristics that are affected by attending coeducational institutions. “Female adolescents who participate in athletics may have higher levels of self-esteem compared to nonathletes because they participate in an activity independent of male social approval in which they can succeed and derive a unique identity” (Dodge & Jaccard, 2002, p. 47).
For female college students being involved in student activities provides a way for students to connect with others, providing support (Tomlinson-Clarke & Clarke, 1994). The importance of finding a way to enhance the college student involvement of women is of great concern. Administrators need to be sure that female students are well represented on campus, not only in leadership positions, but also in roles that allow for their complete development as a college student. “The number of co curricular involvements may not be the critical variable linked to adjustment for this group of women students, but rather being “associated” with a group is related to social adjustment” (Tomlinson-Clarke & Clarke, 1994, p. 123).
Female students participating in college athletics have the ability to be immediately associated with a social group and the development of leadership skills. Leadership development has been directly linked to positive college outcomes (Tomlinson-Clarke & Clarke, 1994). Adolescent females who tend to participate in athletics tend to have higher educational aspirations and higher self-esteem (Dodge & Jaccard, 2002).
Self-esteem has multiple different definitions, but for the purpose of this research, the definition from Coopersmith and Rosenberg will be utilized. Coopersmith (1967) and Rosenberg (1979) suggest that self-esteem is an individual’s personal evaluation of his or her own value and worth (Taylor, 1995). In addition, self-esteem has been linked to personal adjustment, physical health, and academic motivation and success among college students (Brand & Dodd, 1998).
The years that traditional students spend in college are a dynamic period in psychosocial development of young adults (Cornelius, 1995). This is an interesting time in a person’s development and can prove to be a time when significant changes take place. Participation in sports is commonly believed to facilitate positive resolution of the tasks of developing autonomy, establishing identity, managing relationships, and planning for the future (Cornelius, 1995). Cornelius (1995) found that students who identified with the athletic role are more accomplished on developmental tasks associated with life management skills.
Killeya’s (2001) study of African American male and Caucasian male student-athletes found that there was a similar pattern of relationships among the non-cognitive variables of anxiety, role and identity, and academic measures. The study did not find the concept of self-esteem to be the same between the participants. The self-esteem levels for the European-American student-athletes were somewhat smaller and less reliable than for the African-American student-athletes (Killeya, 2001).
Taylor (1995) found that athletic participation has a positive effect on self-esteem, but it is not strong enough to have a statistically significant effect by itself. Pascarella and Smart (1991) also found that when compared to nonathletes who were similar in precollege and other traits, athletes were more likely to have higher levels of social self-esteem (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). According to Pascarella and Smart (1991) the direct effect of athletic participation on social self-esteem was marginally significant for African American males, and Caucasian men’s athletic participation had a significant positive total effect on social self-esteem.
Taylor (1995) proposes that participation in college athletics may affect the student-athlete’s self-esteem. In the study Taylor surveyed male and female athletes from a Division II institution. The research thus far on college student increases in self-esteem focus mainly on going to college, but not on factors that contribute while attending. Much of the research on the development of self-esteem in college students has focused on the effects of attending college in general (Taylor, 1995).
Problem Statement
The problem is that the self-esteem of women seems to be unevaluated for intercollegiate athletes at Division I institutions.
Strengths and Weaknesses of Research
The research conducted from the materials used in the literature review was based on several different methods of analysis. Much of the existing research in athletic participation has focused on athletes from a single institution. The most frequently used method was the completion of surveys. Five of the journal articles selected for the literature review provided strong research findings that made generalizations that are pertinent to the study that will be proposed here. The five studies that are examined further are Pascarella and Smart, 1991, Hood, Craig and Ferguson, 1992, Cornelius, 1995, Killeya, 2001, and Taylor, 1995.
Pascarella and Smart (1991) used analysis from a national database. Their research was only conducted on male participants. This means their work cannot be generalized to the entire athletic population. Female athletes may experience different athletic outcomes. The Pascarella and Smart (1991) study was able to use a large sample size (290 African American men and 1716 Caucasian men) and student-athletes from a wide variety of Division I institutions across the country. All respondents completed the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) survey in 1971 (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). Nine years later this same group of respondents completed a follow up survey that collected information on their actual collegiate experiences as well as their educational and occupational achievements and measures of values and self-esteem (Pascarella & Smart, 1991). Pascarella and Smart were fortunate not to have too much of a mortality rate effect their research findings. This can be one of the threats to internal validity that could have occurred.
The Pascarella and Smart study does not separate the different types of athletic teams. This can have an effect on the outcomes because of the emphasis placed on revenue producing sports (football, basketball, and baseball). Using nonathletes as the comparison group can create a situation where the researchers do not know the other variables that are influencing this group’s lifestyle. A factor other than not being an athlete can affect outcomes of the college experience on the student. The most valid estimates of the impact of athletic participation will come from investigations that can control for differences between athletes and nonathletes on important precollege confounding variables such as self-esteem (Pascarella & Smart, 1991).
Hood, Craig, and Ferguson (1992) only used information from one institution, which means that the results from this study cannot be generalized across all Division I institutions. The survey method that they used was a random mailing to University selected from those who entered the same year as the athlete and matched groups and who were of the same sex (Hood, Craig, & Ferguson, 1992). In this study there was a follow up survey that was sent to those participants who were still enrolled in the University a few years later. There was a 51% response rate from the second survey mailing, thus the final sample consisted of 534 surveys (Hood, Craig, & Ferguson, 1992). Although the sample size for this study was also quite large, the random sampling only came from one University. This limits the accuracy of the results across all academic institutions.
Cornelius (1995) used a series of hierarchical multiple regression analyses to examine the relationships between athletic involvement and developmental tasks, the moderating effects of gender and year in school, and the mediating effects of faculty and peer interactions. The sample size consisted of 224 participants, 76 subjects participated in intercollegiate athletics (Cornelius, 1995). The subjects of this study were not truly randomly selected. The participants were recruited from physical education classes on one Division I campus. Four different questionnaires were utilized in the study. The study was cross-sectional and a longitudinal study would provide more data concerning the relationships between athletic identity, participation in sports, and student development (Cornelius, 1995).
The Killeya (2001) study had a rather small sample size (30 participants) and an all male participant group. The results of this study are less generalizable because of the small number of subjects and the homogeneous gender. The study used a quantitative mathematic measure to calculate the results of the information gathered on the surveys completed. The amount of significance here is relative to the small number of participants.
Taylor’s (1995) study focused on the effects of athletic participation in college athletics and self-esteem. Taylor used male and female students from a Division II institution in his research (230 student-athletes and 421 nonathletes), but did not test for gender differences or differences in sport. The design was ex post facto and cross-sectional (Taylor, 1995). Survey research methods were used to gather data and evaluated to estimate the effects of intercollegiate athletic participation on students’ self-esteem (Taylor, 1995). This study was not a true longitudinal study because of the cross-sectional nature. Conclusions about the effects of athletic participation and global self-esteem cannot be made because of possible differences among he classes on the self-esteem, when the classes entered college (Taylor, 1995).
In Taylor’s (1995) study college student-athletes and nonathletes at a Division II institution were compared to determine the effects of self-esteem. Actual college attendance was shown to have a positive effect on all students’ self-esteem, but the only significant increase in athletes happened during the senior year. Further research is needed to determine the reason for this finding. It may be that athletes who do not quit the sport gain more self-esteem than those who quit. Or it may be that students who have higher self-esteem are able to continue participating in the sport throughout college.
The assumption that the four classes (freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior) had similar self-esteem when they entered college was made to be able to make generalizations about the study (Taylor, 1995). Participation in athletics had higher levels of self-esteem in each class except the freshman class. This may indicate that participation in intercollegiate athletics produces a quicker rebound in self-esteem from the “post freshman” decline (Taylor, 1995). The study does not control for precollege characteristics that could affect the self-esteem of the students when entering college and the higher self-esteem after the freshman year. Self-perceptions of incoming first-year students are weakened due to the transition from high school, where success, recognition, and social support were established, to college, where individual reputations must be redeveloped and new support systems discovered (Brand & Dodd, 1998). Also, the fact that this study tested Division II athletes with male and female athletes combined into one group could have impacted the results in the different classes (Taylor, 1995).