York St John University study highlights that bullying in school sport can have a negative impact on a young person’s engagement in physical activity

A new study suggests that being a victim of bullying in school sport can have a negative impact on a young person’s engagement in physical activity.

The report, undertaken by York St John University and funded by the Ben Cohen StandUp Foundation, also highlights a lack of interventions specific to sporting environments to tackle the problem. The sporting environment is atypical in that it is the one environment where young people are in potentially vulnerable situations in the changing room and showers which may lack adult supervision and playing physically competitive games where rules of engagement are different than in the classroom.

Nathalie Noret, Director of the Unit for Child and Youth Studies at York St John University and co-author of the report, commented: “TheBullying in School Sport report considers incidents of bullying in school sport and found that bullying was common for pupils at both primary and secondary school. Incidents included homophobic and racist language occurring in changing rooms, as well as on school fields, and some were targeted because of sporting ability, weight, size and/or body shape.”

Following on from the report, York St John University and the Ben Cohen StandUp Foundation are planning to develop interventions to tackle bullying in school sport.

Bullying in School Sport can be downloaded here: www.yorksj.ac.uk/bullyinginschoolsport.