Socially vulnerable young people in Flemish sports clubs

Abstract

Sport appears to present a powerful tool for engaging socially vulnerable youth in an organised context, which offers an opportunity to work with them. However, we have little understanding regarding participation of socially vulnerable young people in the ‘traditional’ sport sector (i.e. sports clubs). Nor do we have sufficient insights into how vulnerable young people experience their participation in sports clubs and how they best feel supported. In order to address this question, we interviewed 50 young people and 13 key witnesses (mostly coaches, but also board members and club coordinators) within 15 Flemish (northern Dutch-speaking region of Belgium) traditional sport settings, using semi-structured interviews. Throughout the interviews we noticed that the selected sports clubs offered young people an environment where they could find support, meaning, appreciation, security and caring. The coach played a key role but was not the only factor, since his/her guidance was influenced and steered by the broader organisational and cultural context of the club. From the perspectives and experiences of interviewed youngsters we have identified some aspects that are related to the organisational context, such as first impressions/feelings when joining the sports club, differences between other sports clubs, valued experiences, motives for (non-)participation and dropout. Interviewed young people were, however, rather reserved, perhaps realistic, about popular beliefs in the power of sport to change things for the better.

Keywords

Experiences socially vulnerable youth sports clubs support

The traditional sport sector

According to Crum (2001), traditional sport in Western-Europe is often organised in sports clubs and federations with their primary reason for existence being to provide sporting opportunities for their affiliated members. Crum stated that the traditional sports club functions by the grace of its volunteers, internal democratic decision-making and independence of third parties. He therefore referred to the traditional sport club as a homogenous and solidary community (i.e. characterised by, or having, solidarity or community of interests. Collins (2005) argued that sports clubs are often expressions of narrow subcultures and are, as such, better at producing bonding social capital (between similar people) than bridging or linking social capital (with other types of people).

Recent participation data in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking Northern part of Belgium, have shown that almost three out of four youngsters between the age of 10–17 years are involved in at least one sport (Scheerder et al., 2011). In 2007, 80% of young people indicated that they were member of a sport club (Vanhoutte, 2007). These figures illustrate that sport is a highly accessible activity allowing large numbers of youngsters to become involved. Moreover, it has been shown that, in comparison to other socio-cultural practices (e.g. youth movements, youth centres, youth out-reach practices), sports-based practices seem to be more capable in attracting young people independently of their socio-economic background and seem to provide rich contexts for reaching socially vulnerable young people (Haudenhuyse et al., 2013a). Sport appears to present a powerful tool for engaging socially vulnerable youth in an organised context, which offers an opportunity to work with them. Furthermore, wider benefits accruing from organised sports involvement seem to be stronger for disadvantaged young people and families residing in deprived neighbourhoods (Feinstein et al., 2005; Mahoney et al., 2005). It is for the above-mentioned reasons that youth (welfare) organisations use sport not only as a means for reaching socially vulnerable youth, but also for working towards something beyond mere sport participation (Haudenhuyse et al., 2012; Theeboom et al., 2008).

But what do we know about the relationship between participation of socially vulnerable youth and Crum’s ‘homogenous and solidary community’? Socially vulnerable youngsters are seldom the focal point of sport research in Flanders, so the answer to this question is rather blunt: not much. We have little understanding regarding participation of socially vulnerable youth in the traditional sport sector. Nor do we have insights into how socially vulnerable youth experience their participation in sports clubs and how they best feel supported.

A difficult and under-investigated relationship

The theory of social vulnerability, which draws heavily on Hirschi’s social bonding theory (Hirschi, 2009), broadly refers to the distorted relations of young people with institutions of society, such as family, school, labour market, healthcare and justice (Vettenburg, 1998). Central within the theory of social vulnerability is the progressive accumulation of negative experiences with such institutions, which eventually amount into social disconnectedness and a precarious social trajectory in terms of education and employment. Vettenburg (1998) furthermore argued that those young people benefit to a far lesser extent from the positive aspects that, for example, school, organised leisure services or the labour market can offer. From this perspective, sport club participation might provide a context where socially vulnerable young people could experience the more positive social and developmental aspects that organised sport groups offer. Involvement in sport has been viewed as positively affecting, amongst others, academic achievement, active citizenship, diversion from anti-social and criminal activities, young people’s social outlook and trajectory, moral development and young people's employment (Haudenhuyse et al., 2013b). However, Theeboom et al. (2010) have argued that, in Flanders, the traditional sport sector never played any significant role in the provision of sport opportunities for underprivileged young people. Instead other providers (e.g. the sectors of young people, education, integration, social affairs, prevention) have gradually become involved in the organisation of specific community sport initiatives (Theeboom et al., 2010). This is perhaps surprising, as most of these ‘new’ providers are traditionally not linked to sports provision. In such alternative contexts, sports are used as an opportunity to actively engage socially vulnerable youth in a leisure context and not just in terms of participation in sport activities, but across a range of issues including education, employment and training, community leadership and healthy lifestyles.

Parallel with these trends, research has mainly studied alternative, sports-based social interventions or sport plus programmes in order to understand if and how such programmes can create something more beyond ‘mere participation’ (e.g. Coalter, 2012; Crabbe, 2007; Kay, 2009; Kelly, 2011; Nichols, 2007; Spaaij, 2009). This has left the traditional, voluntary-based sport sector in relation to socially vulnerable young people under-researched. Existing research on sports clubs and socially vulnerable groups seems to focus for most part on how to increase participation among such target groups (e.g. Nichols et al., 2012; Reid, 2012). For example, based on a national survey of sports clubs in England, Nichols et al. (2012) argued that sports clubs having their own facilities, holding junior divisions and larger in size, offer the most viable policy instruments for increasing participation. Often larger sports clubs have higher numbers of paid, qualified and specialised staff and a bigger pool of volunteers – as compared to smaller clubs – which enables them to take up more policies for government (Heinemann, 1995). It is however not clear if and how such characteristics play a role in increasing the participation of disadvantaged and vulnerable groups and, more importantly, in the creation of a social value for such groups. Furthermore, there is a scarcity of research using interpretative approaches that provides us with access to personal perspectives of the lived experiences and social interactions of vulnerable young people involved in traditional organised sport settings.

The lack of research on socially vulnerable youth and sports clubs is problematic, as the organised sport sector (i.e. sports clubs and federations) is regarded as the keystone of the Flemish sport-for-all policy. Sport clubs have been described as the executing body of sport policy implementation (Nichols et al., 2012; Skille, 2011). It is believed that this sector can have a significant contribution in encouraging as many people as possible to become and stay sport active (Theeboom et al., 2010). Reference here, among other things, is often made to high levels of sport technical expertise and to quality structural networks, which facilitate competition organisation and access to adequate sport infrastructure. However, it has been indicated that sports clubs in Flanders are facing a number of problems, which undoubtedly have an impact on the quality of the sport provision they offer (Theeboom et al., 2010). Besides financial and infrastructural problems, there is a lack of qualified sport coaches (i.e. only 53% of all club coaches have a specific sport pedagogical qualification) (Van Lierde and Willems, 2006). Despite a number of specific measures of the Flemish government aimed at a greater involvement of organised sports in the stimulation of socially vulnerable groups, successful initiatives in this sector have remained scarce until now. One of the explanations could be related to the fact that most sports clubs are not confronted with these groups and therefore do not feel a need, or do not have the capacity, to become involved in specific sport stimulation initiatives. There are also doubts regarding the impact of the organised sport sector in catering for socially vulnerable youth (Theeboom et al., 2010). Furthermore, sports clubs come in different types and sizes, which would require tailored support taking into account the specific and varying needs and capabilities of sports clubs (Nichols et al., 2012). As mentioned earlier, sports clubs in Flanders are facing a variety of problems, which will surely affect the quality of their sport provision. It can therefore be expected that services situated outside of their core business (e.g. attracting and keeping socially deprived young people) will not be given any priority and, most likely, will not be provided in an optimal way. This is in line with Coalter (2007), who stated that attempts to use the organised sport sector to achieve wider policy goals (conditions associated with funding) could undermine their essential (mostly non-altruistic) purpose, qualities and stability (see also Harris et al., 2012). Reid (2012) argued that sports clubs are run by volunteers who are motivated by a number of factors, almost certainly not by the policy direction of government. He asserted that if the interest of the clubs and their members can be served by delivering government policy targets (e.g. social inclusion, health, crime prevention), perhaps through increasing funding for the club, or improving facilities, then voluntary sports clubs could make a significant contribution to achieving those targets. In reality such increased funding and support is often missing or, where present, is not tailor-made.

Notwithstanding the ability of sport to attract young people of different socio-economical backgrounds, it has been argued that traditional mainstream sports clubs, are often viewed as being ineffective and unsuitable for engaging socially vulnerable groups (Andrews and Andrews, 2003; Sugden and Yiannakis, 1982). Researching UK and US-based sport inclusion programmes for young people, Green (2008) found that the most effective programmes are those that differ from traditional sport provisions (such as sports clubs). It is argued that the way sports are traditionally provided and practised generates and amplifies mechanisms of inclusion as well as of exclusion (Andrews and Andrews, 2003; Elling and Claringbould, 2005). For example, Fraser-Thomas et al. (2005) held that many youth sport programmes promote masculinity, aggression and competition. In his analysis of sport-for-all policies in Scandinavian countries, Skille (2011) stated that the organisational structure of sports clubs does not support sport-for-all policies, although it supports and expresses result-oriented and commercial philosophies. Emphasising competition has been related to increased feelings of stress and anxiety (Andrews and Andrews, 2003; Magee and Jeanes, 2011), which increase detrimental effects on already defective bonding processes for socially vulnerable youth. It has furthermore been suggested that certain vulnerable (young) people reject organised, competitive mainstream sports because such settings contain components similar to those that they have already failed to resolve (e.g. adherence to formal rules, achievement of externally-defined goals and testing situations in formal educational settings) (Andrews and Andrews, 2003; Sugden and Yiannakis, 1982). That said, traditional organised sport provisions do not, by definition, instigate processes of exclusion or aggravate social vulnerability. Neither do alternative sport programmes automatically provide inclusion mechanisms. In a study on alternative sport provision schemes targeting at-risk inner city young people (i.e. the open sport hall, Norway), Skille and Waddington (2006) discovered that the high level of informality and flexibility actually facilitated the development of traditional and hegemonic patterns of gender relations. The direct outcome was that girls and younger boys were largely being excluded from the self-organised activities. As lack of adult control was the main culprit (Skille and Waddington, 2006), activities comprised of primarily peer participants, compared to those involving family members or other adults, may have negative effects on social bonding processes for socially vulnerable youth.

As a result, we are left with the question whether traditional sports clubs can offer sufficient conditions through which broader social outcomes can be generated for socially vulnerable youth. In order to address this question from the perspective of young people themselves, we interviewed 50 young people and 13 key witnesses (mostly coaches, but also board members and club coordinators) within 15 Flemish ‘traditional’ sport settings, using semi-structured interviews. The field research was done during May and August 2012 by the first and third authors. In this paper we will mostly focus on the interviews done with young people. Where relevant, perspectives from key witnesses will also be used. The present study aims at providing more insights into the characteristics of existing traditional sport practices by analysing the views and experiences of socially vulnerable youngsters involved. More specifically, we were interested in how socially vulnerable youth experience their sport, what they consider as important for them in their sporting experience(s), and under which conditions they best feel supported.

Field research

Sample and general research methodology

An initial list was made containing 34 sports clubs that attract socially vulnerable youth. It has been estimated by the Flemish Research Department that in 2012 there were around 18,402 sports clubs in Flanders (Research Department of the Flemish Department, 2012). As such the identified sports clubs can not be seen as representative of all of the Flemish sports clubs, but nonetheless they provide a useful sample in relation to the theme of this paper. The selection was based on the suggestions of an advisory board (n = 10) consisting of representatives of sport federations, local sport administrations, youth welfare organisations and specific practices working with socially vulnerable youth. The main criteria for inclusion of clubs on the list were: good reach and/or reputation of working with socially vulnerable youth; recognition by the local sport administration; affiliated to a federation; voluntary-run; and operating in an urban context. The list was then narrowed down to 15 clubs, taking into account a diversity of geographic locations and sport disciplines. The following disciplines were included: Brazilian jujitsu, swimming, basketball, boxing, Thai-boxing, taekwondo, track and field, wushu, combat sambo (form of Russian wrestling and grappling), dance, gymnastics, indoor soccer, netball and multi-sports.

The responsible person for every sport club was contacted personally and informed about the purpose of the study. In total, 50 youngsters (29 boys and 21 girls) from 15 sports clubs were interviewed. Two clubs did not allow participants to be interviewed. Informed consent was acquired from the youngsters at the start of each interview. Ages ranged from 9–22 years (mean: 15.28 years; standard deviation (SD) = 3.23 years.). Forty-seven of the interviewed youngsters had participated for more than six months in the given sport club. Of those interviewed, 36% were involved for more than one year, and 28% for more than three years. Almost half of the interviewees attended activities twice a week. Minors received a letter for their parents or legal guardian with an explanation of the purpose of the study as well as the possibility to refrain from involvement (passive informed consent). Interviews with young people, ranging on average 33 min, were conducted before, during or after the training sessions. In the first part of the interview we ascertained items related to the youngsters’ sporting experience: first impressions and feelings with regard to the sports club; sport biography; valued aspects of sporting experience; differences with other sports clubs; perspectives about friends’ sports clubs; interactions with coach and others; meaning and added value of sport. A second shorter part of the interview consisted of questions related to background characteristics (personal, parents), indicators of social vulnerability (educational path, work and family situation, migrant background) and subjective feelings of social exclusion (see e.g. Sletten, 2010).

Interviews were tape-recorded and, following a verbatim transcription, analysed inductively. As a general framework for approaching the data, we used an interpretative phenomenological approach (IPA) which allowed us to understand the data from the perspective and experience of the interviewees relating to a shared phenomenon (i.e. doing sport in a specific context). IPA examines the lived experiences of participants and explores how they make sense of their experiences (Frost et al., 2010). All names that are used in the remainder of this paper are pseudonyms, but take gender and ethnic origin into account (Table 1).

Table 1

Overview of young people who were interviewed (name (age) sport discipline).

Abdel (17) jujitsu	Dianne (13) basketball	Kelly (21) netball	Saïd (19) athletics
Abel (14) dance	Dmitri (15) Thai-boxing	Kevin (18) wushu	Selim (15) jujitsu
Abu (20) combat sambo	Emma (13) gymnastics	Khalid (14) athletics	Serhat (14) Thai-boxing
Adar (19) combat sambo	Eric (19) basketball	Chris (22) taekwondo	Sinan (16) indoor soccer
Aisha (10) jujitsu	Esra (13) boxing	Lahbib (16) Thai-boxing	Sophie (19) taekwondo
Aleksander (16) combat sambo	Fadila (13) basketball	Lisa (18) taekwondo	Wendy (16) dance
Amandine (13) dance	Farah (13) gymnastics	Maja (12) basketball	Wouter (19) athletics
Aouicha (13) athletics	Ghaliya (18) wushu	Marion (17) jujitsu	Ye (12) boxing
Ayur (14) Thai-boxing	Greet (18) swimming	Nadira (14) basketball	Yusuf (15) jujitsu
Azara (12) dance	Hakan (21) indoor soccer	Nathalie (18) boxing	Zeki (12) boxing
Bart (9) taekwondo	Halil (12) taekwondo	Radomir (11) combat sambo	Zemar (15) taekwondo
Bashshar (16) athletics	Hamit (22) indoor soccer	Ramona (12) athletics	Zhen (12) gymnastics
Bilal (13) athletics	Jalila (11) athletics

Based on the methodology described in Scanlan et al. (1991), raw data units (i.e. citations) were clustered into first order common themes, which were then grouped into three second order higher themes, namely: meaning of sport for young people, young people about the sports club, and young people about coaching. The second order higher themes needed to be able to offer a framework for addressing our research question from the perspective and experience of the interviewees.

Did we interview socially vulnerable youth?

Selecting young people who can be considered as socially vulnerable is not an easy task. Since we only visited the sports clubs once, we asked responsible people (often coaches) present at each setting to get us in touch with young people they considered as socially vulnerable. It was assumed that coaches who worked with these youngsters on a weekly basis could make a good judgement, and could be used as gatekeepers. Interviewed key witnesses often referred to vulnerable and precarious family situations, due to a multiplicity of causes and factors such as unemployment, limited comprehension of Dutch, (non-Western) immigrant background, lack of parents’ pedagogical capabilities, problematic legal status and poor housing/living conditions. Furthermore, according to the key witnesses of the visited practices, socially vulnerable youth have a negative self-image, little belief in their future, negative experiences with educational institutions and a weak social network. Some key witnesses also referred to problematic drug and alcohol use, and young people with mental and physical disabilities. In general, such youngsters were confronted in their daily lives with more challenges, prejudices and discrimination and less opportunities compared to their peers, as was expressed by one of the key witnesses:

These youngsters are confronted with forms of social exclusion in their lives. They don’t always get equal chances in society. They have to fight harder. They’re often discriminated, although this might be too big of a word. But they find themselves more frequently at the non-receiving end, because they aren’t strong enough. In that way, they are in a vicious circle of being excluded and receiving fewer chances. (wushu coach)

Almost half of the interviewed youngsters (n = 22) had to repeat a year in school, which may indicate a negative, vulnerable relationship with school (Vettenburg, 1998). Looking at Table 1, we see a majority of the youngsters with a non-western ethnic background (Turkish, Moroccan, Chechen, Kurdish). Although belonging to an ethnic minority group does not necessarily imply social vulnerability, it does however – combined with other structural and cultural factors – reinforce processes of social vulnerability (Vettenburg, 1998) and increases the chances of poverty (Van Robaeys et al., 2007). A third of the interviewed youngsters live in single parent families. Data in Belgium have repeatedly shown that children in single-parent households have a substantially higher risk of growing up in poverty (35.3%), as compared to two-parent households (14.6%) (Pannecoucke, 2013). According to Collins and Kay (2003), poverty and material deprivation constitute the core of social exclusion, and as such instigate processes of social vulnerability. One-quarter of the interviewees indicated that both of their parents were unemployed. Half of the mothers did not work. Gaining more specific hard data about the socio-economic (vulnerable) position of young people was however not possible due to the limited time window of the interviews. In one question we explicitly asked young people if they would consider themselves as vulnerable or excluded as compared to their peers. One of the youngsters responded:

Yes, sometimes you see that you are in a worse situation than other people. And then you feel a bit bad about yourself. But on the other hand, it isn’t all that bad if you can practice sport and all, and have it good at home. (Farah, 13 years, gymnastics)

Somewhat surprisingly, the majority of young people did not consider themselves as socially vulnerable, poor or confronted with more problems compared to their peers. This is in line with Sutton et al. (2007) who found in their participatory research about social differences that none of the children identified themselves as poor or rich. Children stressed the importance of not being seen as different from their own peer group and related concepts such as poverty and wealth to other people in extreme (third world) circumstances (Sutton et al., 2007). Notwithstanding the general finding that youngsters did not feel that they were socially vulnerable, specific elements throughout the interviews pointed towards precarious family circumstances:

It wasn’t always easy with my father. He’s a schizophrenic and my mother has problems too. So yeah, both parents have psychological problems. (Kevin, 18 years, wushu)

We argue a lot and if it gets out of hand, we start yelling or beating each other. (Sophie, 19 years, taekwondo)

Based on the abovementioned information, it was concluded that we were interviewing young people living in vulnerable situations. In the following sections the results are discussed.

Results

Meaning(s) of sports

Youngsters were asked to respond to the following statement: ‘Some people say that through sports, youngsters who have it difficult at home or school, can “become better”. That through sports youngsters can cope better with their problems. Do you believe that?’ Half of the interviewees agreed with this statement:

That’s just completely true … Especially when you’re good at it. If you are, for example, laughed at or bullied at school. But apart from school you’ve got a sport club or a place to go. A place where you can show how good you are at something. That really feels good, And you can take that feeling to school. Confidence you know. Like that. (Saïd, 19 years, track and field)

Twenty youngsters explicitly indicated that sports could offer such an opportunity. Five young people asserted that they did not believe sport could change things for the better. All in all, youngsters were rather nuanced regarding the proclaimed social transformative power of sports:

After school I sometimes get very tired or stressed out. Fed up with everything, school, exams … But then I come here, practice sport for an hour and then I really forget everything. That really relaxes me, brings everything out. But for big problems, I don’t know if it would help. (Ghaliya, 18 years, wushu)

It might be good for young people to get rid of stress and frustration for a while. But that’s not going to solve their problems and it isn’t going to make them better. If you do sports and five minutes later when you get home there’s all sorts of bullshit, then it won’t make a lot of difference. (Kelly, 21 years, netball)

Such findings resonate with Chamberlain (2013), who reported that studies from Austria, England, Scotland, Norway and Germany concluded that participation in sport seems to be of marginal influence when compared with primary agents of socialisation and social integration such as family, peers and school. However, throughout the interviews we did notice that sports clubs offered young people an environment where they could find support, meaning, appreciation, security and caring, which are perhaps less likely to be provided by schools, family or other (sports) contexts. The importance of a supportive environment was also found throughout the interviews of the key witnesses, which can be illustrated by the next quote. It shows that such a supportive environment requires specific actions and efforts that go beyond merely offering sports:

They feel at home here. They always look forward coming here … We have vulnerable youngsters who prefer to be here instead of at home. We also found out that you don’t keep your members with sport alone. That there needs to be something other, more than just sports. (swim club president)

Youngsters were also asked the following question: ‘What if you hadn’t joined this sport club, would your life have been any different?’ The answers broadly referred to five categories: (a) health-related benefits (e.g. improved endurance); (b) sport specific abilities; (c) individual growth (e.g. self-control, assertiveness), (d) social gains (e.g. making friends) and (e) a sense of identity and belonging (e.g. being somebody). One of the interviewees said the following:

I think I would be less … euhm … it’s possible that I would be less open. That I would dare less, be very shy. I don’t know … I think it has something to do with the club. You get to know people and learn how to deal with people. (Ghaliya, 18 years, wushu)

However the identified five categories of experienced benefits are not automatically generated, as certain conditions need to be fulfilled. Throughout young people’s interviews the most often cited factor that played a crucial role in generating beneficial experiences was the coach. In the following sections we will discuss youngsters’ experiences regarding the sport coach and sport club.

Young people and coaching

Understanding

What is important for young people in their sporting experience(s), and under which conditions do they feel best supported? From the interviews of young people and key-witnesses we found that the sport coach played a key role in creating positive and supportive experiences. Such findings are in accordance with other research (e.g. Bailey et al., 2009; Crabbe, 2007; Haudenhuyse et al., 2012; Theeboom et al., 2008). Young people stressed that a coach needs to be somebody whom they can talk to. A coach who takes the time to understand and steps into young people’s world outside the sport club:

If something unpleasant happened or when you’re angry, he asks ‘what’s up?’. And he really sees if you’re happy or angry. (Ramona, 12 years, track and field)

He also needs to show understanding for people who have it difficult at home. Show consideration. Talk with them, and look for solutions together. Instead of pulling people further down. (Kelly, 21 years, netball)

From this perspective, sports clubs could be viewed as contexts that, through working with young people, provide us the understanding how structures and arrangements of society make young people vulnerable in the first place (Haudenhuyse et al., 2012). Such an understanding is, as Haudenhuyse et al. (2012) argued, critically important if we wish to meaningfully intervene in the lives of young people through sports, with the aim of broadening young people’s action potential and increasing developmental opportunities.

Sport skills

Becoming more proficient in their sports and learning new skills were important motives for young people to become and stay involved. This is line with Collins and Kay (2003) who emphasised the importance of the support and counselling process in sports-based intervention programmes for socially vulnerable young people, which they regarded as equally important as the activities themselves. When inquiring about the qualities of a good sport coach, interviewees asserted that, apart from social skills, a coach needs to be proficient in his or her sport, be able to teach young people relevant and desired sporting skills, and offer settings to practise or show such acquired skills (e.g. contest, competition).

Yes, if you go to a sport club, you actually just want to practise that sport. Certainly if it’s a specific sport. (Chris, 22 years, taekwondo)

They do the exercise once and after that they start chatting. At a certain moment you get tired of that. You’re not a child anymore. You’re here to practise. (Abdel, 17 years, jujitsu)

Group dynamics and diversity

Integrating newcomers in the group, resolving conflicts, being able to handle diversity and promoting a positive group climate were all group dynamic processes of which youngsters thought a coach should be able to act upon. One of the interviewees said: ‘When there was a conflict, we all sat down in a circle. We talked things through and discussed what the problem was and what we could do about it.' (Nadira, 14 years, Basketball). Of the 50 interviewed youngsters, 39 perceived their sport club to be more diverse in terms of members with different ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs and country of origin in comparison with other sports clubs. More importantly, 32 interviewees indicated that they preferred such diverse settings.

Cool. You get to know some new things. Like other norms and values. That you do need to adapt yourself a bit. That you can laugh less with some things. And perhaps a bit more with some other things … It takes some adjusting, but that’s kind of nice. (Wouter, 19 years, track and field)

Mixed is much more fun. Because then you can talk about your own country. (Azara, 12 years, dancing)

At ballet, if I may be honest, it was all like … Flemish kids. And here you feel more at home actually. (Fadila, 13 years, basketball)

Such findings are in line with Theeboom et al. (2012) who stated that mixed sport club (adult) members indicated that they learned to make contact with others and learned about, for example, other ethnic groups. Although youngsters expressed that they appreciated – even preferred – diversity, they expected the sport club, and the sport coach in the first place, to be able cope with such diversity in a proper way (e.g. clear rules). Regarding the competence to handle diversity, the interviewees in our study broadly referred to the following dimensions: ethnic origin, conviction, disabilities, sexual orientation, home situation (e.g., poverty) and sporting abilities.

That’s really pff … you talk a bit, and they get upset immediately. Like, we have two disabled kids and they can’t stand that! It’s always those two! But we also have a right to live, yes? Give me a break … It’s really starting to get me angry! (Amandine, 13 years, dance)

The moment I said in that club that I was a lesbian. Then it was like ‘we don’t want to shower with you anymore’, ‘don’t come near me’ and things like that … I told this to some of my teachers at school … One of the teachers called the schools of the other baseball players to teach them about homosexuality. Then they accepted that. Then they started talking to me like ‘for me it’s okay’. But sometimes still with a strange look. (Greet, 18 years, baseball)

People of other nationalities joined in. No exclusion, you know. And because of the rules during practice, that you can only speak Dutch … I think that’s very good. (Sinan, 16 years, indoor soccer)

We need to ask ourselves why the selected sports clubs have apparently succeeded in reaching (and keeping) socially vulnerable young people. Although coaches play a crucial role, most youngsters do not (yet) know their coaches (and their coaching qualities) well before joining the sport club. Evidently every coach is influenced and steered in his or her guidance by the broader organisational and cultural context that makes up the sport club. Vettenburg (2011) identified the variance between the mainstream culture(s) embedded within social institutions (e.g. school, sport club) and the culture of the family, as the most important instigator of processes of social vulnerability (e.g. discrimination, sanctioning and marginalisation). Hence, the importance of understanding how sports clubs can better match/bridge such potential cultural variances. In the following part we will look closer at some features of the selected sport club organisational contexts through the eyes and (shared) experiences of the youngsters.

Young people and the sport club

First contact

Young people were mainly introduced to their sports clubs through friends and family but also, in some cases, through youth workers and teachers. From the interviews with the key witnesses we further learned that close cooperation with local schools was vital in reaching socially vulnerable youth. Another factor that the youngsters (and key witnesses) often mentioned was the financial costs of sport participation. More specifically, this means the reputation a sport club has in having high or low membership fees.

Yes, here it’s not expensive at all. In another club it’s €300 … Here you can train for eight year with €300. They did this because it’s a club … it’s a club that doesn’t ask much. (Diane, 13 years, basketball)

Barriers and gateways

So why do other young people choose not to participate in the selected sports clubs? We confronted the interviewed youngsters with this question and they indicated the following reasons as most important: no interest in doing sports, no time, not allowed by their parents, and membership fees too high. Notwithstanding the fact that most selected sports clubs had democratic membership fees, interviewees still believed that for some young people the financial cost posed an important factor for non-participation.

When you went there, you were required to buy the gym suits of the club and then also pay the membership fee. And here, you can just put on your sporting clothes. (Farah, 13 years, gymnastics)

These findings correlate with other studies. For example, through brainstorming sessions with minority urban young people involved in young people's programmes, Perkins et al. (2007) found that being too busy or lacking time, lacking parental permission and having other interests, were motives for non-participation. We further asked young people if they could remember their first time in the sport club, and what they thought a club should do so that young people feel immediately at home. The interviewees referred to the necessity of welcoming newcomers, talking with them and giving them extra attention and motivation. Creating a welcoming climate in which young people were integrated into the group, through specific activities or actions, was considered as important.

At that club I didn’t feel immediately at home. They didn’t really engage with the kids. It was just enrolling yourself, paying and immediately practising. It wasn’t much of an atmosphere. For me that’s not really a good welcome. If you don’t have any friends or so, you will feel lonely. After a while you will be okay, but in the beginning … (Hamit, 22 years, indoor soccer)

Staying in

Reaching socially vulnerable youngsters requires specific efforts on behalf of the sport club (e.g. community-based approach). However, keeping them and creating sufficient conditions to work towards something beyond mere participation, may prove to be more difficult. We asked young people why they choose to stay. The main reasons why they stay were related to: the social atmosphere (e.g. friendship), relationship with their sport coaches, enjoyment of playing their sports, and practical factors such as distance to the sport club and low membership fees. We further asked young people how their sport club could become more fun and better for them. Although youngsters in general were satisfied, room for improvement was related to the offered sport activities (e.g. higher frequency of sport activities, better hours, more competition opportunities, more and higher qualified sport coaches) and resources (e.g. better infrastructure, equipment). Another important aspect that ran through several interviews was the organisation of additional sport activities, such as vacation camps, trips, going out and other more informal activities. Interviewees often saw these additional activities as settings to strengthen the social ties between members.

That we, for example, go more on camping trips. Because that’s super fun and you get to go somewhere. And go sleeping there, just like with a youth organisation … Like, we were in a forest and then we had to find our way back to the city on our own. (Dianne, 13 years, basketball)

Dropping out

Almost half of the youngsters we interviewed (46%) had participated in more than one sport club. We asked them about the reasons why they left their former clubs. Their answers could be categorised in three clusters: (a) social well-being, (b) sport related factors and (c) practical problems.

I stopped because I was fed up with it. I was still little. I didn’t have many friends and I was being bullied. (Esra, 13 years, boxing)

I was rather good at swimming. But they set the bar too high. You had to keep going and so. Even when you were tired, you just had to continue. That was a little bit irritating. (Amandine, 13 years, dance)

Financially it was difficult for my mum to pay for that. If you’re single with three children and unemployed, then it’s very difficult. (Kelly, 21 years, netball)

The abovementioned motives such as being bullied, an overemphasis on sport competence and financial costs give us more insights into why youngsters quit. Key witnesses emphasised the importance of understanding the motives for dropout and in some cases verbalised that they track young people who do not attend activities regularly or who had not showed up for a while. In most cases youngsters (or parents) were contacted by telephone, and in some cases house-visits were undertaken.

Discussion

It could be argued that the findings from this study would not be fundamentally different when we would have interviewed young people who are in less socially vulnerable situations. Such assumptions are sensible considering the fact that socially vulnerable youth are first and foremost young people searching, just like their peers, for identity and meaning in their leisure time. Additionally, taking into account the theory of social vulnerability, assumed similarities are not surprising. The progressive accumulation of negative experiences, which often amount to stigmatisation, sanctioning, marginalisation and the self-perception of incompetence, follows the same trajectories as their more positive counterparts (see Haudenhuyse et al., 2013b; Vettenburg, 1997). Although the processes might run through the same mechanisms, the implications resulting from such processes on the lives and sport club participation of socially vulnerable young people are quite different. From this backdrop, we briefly review the findings, and formulate recommendations for sports clubs, coaches and coaching curricula/qualifications.

The central role of the coach is equally important for young people in general. However, given the lack of positive personal and social developmental opportunities and stressful relationships with authoritative adults, it can be argued that the coach-participant relationship is of even more significant importance when working with socially vulnerable youth (Haudenhuyse et al., 2013b; Theeboom et al., 2008). Critical success factors are the long-term, intense and in-depth relationships between participants and staff, and the provision of a safe and supportive environment (Coalter, 2007). Such qualitative relationships hold the potential to contribute better understanding of the concrete life situation and challenges young people face, of which the importance was conveyed by some of the young people we interviewed. Coaches would then need to develop strategies for cultivating such relationships with young people. Jones and Deutsch (2010) identified three strategies for youth workers – which might also have relevance for sport coaches – that served as the foundation for both youth engagement in the activities and the promotion of positive outcomes: (a) minimising relational distance; (b) active inclusion; and (c) attention to proximal relational ties. Interviewed young people often mentioned the importance of relational distance and active inclusion when asked about, for example, first contact with the sport club. Again, such dimensions are perhaps more important for socially vulnerable people, given their negative experiences in relation to society’s institutions and social provisions. Moreover, the perceived similarities between participants and the coach are viewed as having a big impact in influencing bonding and socialisation processes (Coalter, 2007). Coalter (2007) argued that such personal features have substantial influence when working with socially vulnerable youth, and this even more so when compared to their non-vulnerable peers. As we have described earlier, processes of stigmatisation, sanctioning and exclusion are often instigated by variances between the mainstream culture of, for example, the sport club and that of the family. This can be related to the notion of cultural capital, as conceptualised by Bourdieu (1986). Similarities would then refer to shared interests as well as to shared cultural competence that stem from specific knowledge, language and lifestyle (Bourdieu, 1986).

Socially vulnerable youth are, more than their peers, being confronted with feelings (and expectations of others towards them) of incompetence, failure, rejection and lower self-esteem (Vettenburg, 1998). From this perspective it would be critical for a coach to create a climate in which young people have higher chances to experience feelings of success and acceptance through developing desired and valued sport skills. In his evaluation of a sports-based intervention in Brazil, Spaaij (2012) found that coaches ‘manipulated’ the sports activities through modifying the rules and changing team composition. Such manipulations contributed to the creation of an inclusive participatory learning environment in which all participants had the opportunity to develop social skills and relationships (Spaaij, 2012). We already indicated that certain young people reject organised, competitive mainstream sports, because such contexts contain components similar to those that they have already failed to resolve (Andrews and Andrews, 2003; Sugden and Yiannakis, 1982). A supportive, open-ended, individualised and less conventional sport developmental approach would then seems to be a necessity. This might provide a challenge for sports clubs that are often from a sport-for-all philosophy constructed for mass participation. In this context Chamberlain (2013: 7) stated that ‘activities must be purposeful for the individual and tailored to their needs, rather than being constructed for mass participation in a one-size-fits-all fashion’.

Vettenburg (1998) has indicated that processes of social vulnerability are cumulative and often passed on from parents to their children. Parents still count as one of the most influencing socialisation agents in relation to young people’s sport participation, The likelihood of partaking in sports, correlates highly with family characteristics such as family structure and socio-economic status (Kay and Spaaij, 2011). According to Collins and Kay (2003) poverty and material deprivation, reinforced by other factors, constitute the core of social exclusion. And although international studies have shown mixed and contradicting results regarding the correlation between young people’s sport participation and the socio-economic status of their parents (see for example Jakobsson et al., 2012), young people (and key witnesses) we interviewed did point to the financial costs as potential barriers and gateways for initiating and continuing club sport participation.

Again the reasons we found in relation to continuing or breaking club sport participation (i.e. social well-being, sport related factors, practical problems) are probably similar for less socially vulnerable youth, although the more practical and financial factors might have a more substantial impact for youngsters in socially vulnerable situations. The data indicate that sports clubs therefore need to incorporate pro-active and flexible membership policies for reaching and retaining socially vulnerable young people. Investing in tracking young people who have not showed up for a while - by even doing house visits - was often mentioned by interviewed key witnesses in relation to the participation of socially vulnerable young people. It is questionable if such specific data in relation to continuing or breaking participation, would have been found to the same degree when the focus would have been on less disadvantaged young people.

Conclusion

One of the questions we asked in the beginning of this paper was if traditional sport club could play a wider social role for socially vulnerable young people. And if so, how? We present one view from a key witness to answer this question:

I always say that a sport club underestimates its pedagogical role in working with youngsters. And that’s really a shame. Maybe they don’t benefit directly from it, since they have to do extra things. But I look much further than that. I think it’s extremely selfish only to look at ‘that child can get me titles or money’. It’s really a shame if one only focuses on that. The improvement of the quality of society is much more important. (wushu coach)

This study has provided access to perspectives of socially vulnerable youngsters regarding their lived experiences within traditional organised sport settings. And has, as such, contributed to a much-needed field of research. From the interviews with these youngsters we found that sport club participation generated positive and supportive experiences for them. We do need to stress however that we have looked at specific practices. Based on both the interviews of young people and key witnesses, we further found that creating such experiences requires specific efforts on behalf of the sport club and the coach. In relation to the question whether sport could contribute in making socially vulnerable people less vulnerable, the interviewed youngsters were rather reserved, perhaps realistic, about popular beliefs in the power of sport to change things for the better. In his analysis of the Sport Steward Program (Netherlands), a sports-based intervention (not a sport club) which aimed at improving the social outlook and employability prospects of long-term un-employed and underemployed young people, Spaaij (2009) argued that in many cases the programme failed to break through the system of social reproduction. Throughout the interviews we noticed that the selected sports clubs offered young people an environment where they could find support, meaning, appreciation, security and caring. The coach played a key role, but was not the only (f)actor, since his/her guidance is influenced and steered by the broader organisational and cultural context of the club. From the perspective and experience of the interviewees we have identified some aspects that are related to the organisational context, such as first impressions/feelings when joining the sport club, differences between other sports clubs, valued experiences, motives for (non-)participation and dropout.

We could summarise the findings of this study as consistent with what Coakley (2011: 310) has stated in relation to working with young people in a sport settings towards positive youth development: ‘sport participation must occur in settings where young people are physically safe, personally valued, morally and economically supported, personally and politically empowered and hopeful about the future’. In order to create such settings, sports clubs will, as one of the coaches fittingly formulated ‘have to do extra things’.

Limitations and implications for further research

Although this study provided insights into sport club participation from the perspectives of young people who could be considered as socially vulnerable, the research has several limitations. We discuss three important interrelated limitations.

First and foremost, the researched sport practices are not representative for the traditional sports clubs in Flanders, nor are the interviewed youngsters representative of the multifarious experiences of socially vulnerable youth in traditionally organised sport settings.

Secondly, we interviewed young people only once and talked with them on average for 30 min. Such one-shot interview sessions have clear drawbacks. In a study examining methodological aspects of interviewing young people, Basset et al. (2008) stated that encouraging young people to have a conversation in a semi-structured or qualitative interview is fraught with difficulties. Building trust is stressed as a means to get young people involved and willing to hold a conversation and share their experiences (Basset et al., 2008). This might be harder to establish when interviewing socially vulnerable youth in a time window of 30 min, considering their already-negative experiences with mainstream social institutions, of which researchers from academic institutions are potential representatives. In relation to working with socially vulnerable young people, Smith (2003) stated that the relational aspect constitutes the cornerstone of youth work practices. If building relationships is at the heart of working with socially vulnerable youth, then it seems only reasonable that this core principle also applies to doing research with them. It is a challenge though as to how research, as a standardised, formalised and institutionalised practice, is able to reach levels of immersion and building relationships that are sufficient for understanding socially vulnerable youth’s experiences. The institutional context of academic research is however seldom examined in published research (Fox, 2013). Furthermore, the pressure put on sports scientists to pursue more evidence-based forms of empirical research (Silk et al., 2010), may in fact contribute to research designs and methods that exclude certain young people or are less effective in giving young people the opportunity to express their own perspectives and feelings. From the above, it would seem that establishing a level of trust and reaching a mutual understanding between interviewer and interviewee, require more than one-shot well-prepared semi-structured interviews. These are, somewhat problematically, the most used methods in the research area of investigating the wider (social) role of sport for young people (including this study). More participatory and collaborative methodologies are therefore required which can offer opportunities for accessing young people’s experiences and knowledge. Fox (2013) gives us a warning when using participatory research, which is according to the author often adult-led, tokenistic and poorly theorised. Fox (2013: 10) stated that: ‘…formal research practices and the discursive context of traditional academia emerge as fundamental barriers to meaningful participation in research for young people’. She further argued that participatory and collaborative research needs to be fun (rarely considered in academic research), informal (i.e. drawing on everyday ways of acting) and clearly focused on issues that are directly relevant to young people (Fox, 2013).

And thirdly, an important limitation of this study is the fact that the theory of social vulnerability was not explicitly mentioned and discussed in relation to sport club participation with interviewed young people. On the one hand, this was from the concern not to label, or even stigmatise, young people as ‘socially vulnerable’. Sports clubs (i.e. coaches, coordinators) also formulated this concern when we contacted them for interviewing young people. On the other hand, discussing the theory of social vulnerability in a dialogical interaction (Freire, 2008) with young people was not feasible due to the fact that we only ‘briefly’ interviewed young people. However, not explicating the theoretical framework may have impeded the research in understanding how experiences within a sport club setting are related to young people’s social vulnerability. France (2004: 183) argued that: ‘… if we are committed to listening to young people’s voice we need to give them detailed information about the research … Doing this requires us to enter into dialogue with them about the aims and objectives of the research …’. Incorporating a more transparent way of doing research is believed to generate more interesting and worthwhile findings, which can positively impact the lives of young people (Alderson, 2004). Social vulnerability is essentially a multi-layered and multifaceted concept that varies between individuals. Such variations in relation to, for example, gender, social-economic status, housing and family conditions, ethnicity, mental/physical abilities and sexuality could have been (and should be) discussed with young people in relation to their sports club participation. And more specifically, how such variations are related to potential positive (and negative) experiences related to and meanings attached to different contexts of sport club participation. However the research design did not allow exploration of such issues. What we did learn from the interviews was that young people found meaning and support within the context of the sport club that they currently participated in, but often referred to other sport club contexts where such experiences where non-existent or even negative. Obviously, we interviewed socially vulnerable youth who are participating in a sport club over a period. This means that we have no insights into the experiences from socially vulnerable people who were only momentarily involved in a sport club. Young people might have more negative experiences than reported in this study, which subsequently could contribute to reinforcing processes of social vulnerability. More in-depth and differentiated research is needed that explores which sports club participation, and under what conditions, may be experienced more or less positively for different groups of socially vulnerable youth.

Footnotes

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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