Journal article
Neighborhood Context as a Barrier to Sport Participation for Girls: Evidence From a Sport Diversity Index
Journal of athletic training, v 59(5), pp 465-473
01 May 2024
PMID: 38243737
Featured in Collection : UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
Abstract
Evidence suggests neighborhood contexts play a vital role in shaping the availability and diversity of youth sport and participation rates, especially for African American or Black girls. Currently, no index captures interscholastic sport opportunities (eg, sport diversity) within and across school districts and specifically applied to African American or Black girls.
To visualize the inequalities present in interscholastic sport opportunities for girls across school districts using a novel index in a selected study area of St Louis City and County, Missouri, and discuss the implications for African American or Black girls.
Cross-sectional study.
Database secondary analysis.
Data for 47 public high schools in the 23 St Louis City and County school districts.
We gathered data from the 2014-2018 American Community Survey and Missouri State High School Activities Association. We assessed sport diversity for girls by constructing a sport diversity index (SDI) that uses an entropy index as its foundation. Census-tract data were used to examine the association with neighborhood demographics and contributors to school district income and sport diversity. Descriptive spatial statistics were calculated to evaluate distributions in St Louis City and County, with the bivariate local indicator of spatial autocorrelation used to determine any correlations between variables of interest.
The St Louis City school district, which has areas with high rates of renter-occupied housing and poverty and high percentages of non-Hispanic African American or Black students, had the lowest SDI for girls, contrasted with the school districts in St Louis County, which showed an inverse pattern on average. The SDI for girls was correlated with the percentages of renter-occupied housing and poverty. The SDI for girls was also correlated with race: an increasing presence of the non-Hispanic African American or Black population was associated with decreased sport diversity for girls.
The SDI for girls demonstrated a spatial association with neighborhood-level determinants of sport-opportunity availability for non-Hispanic African American or Black girls in St Louis. The role of social and political determinants of health in shaping community context and resultant health in athletic training research, policy, and practice should be considered.
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Details
- Title
- Neighborhood Context as a Barrier to Sport Participation for Girls: Evidence From a Sport Diversity Index
- Creators
- Kemba Noel-London - The Ohio State UniversityEnbal Shacham - Saint Louis UniversityKasim Ortiz - Drexel UniversityRhonda BeLue - The University of Texas at San Antonio
- Publication Details
- Journal of athletic training, v 59(5), pp 465-473
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Health Management and Policy
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:001239226600005
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85194216091
- Other Identifier
- 991021899211904721
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- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- Web of Science research areas
- Sport Sciences