Sporting Activities in Preventing Deviant Behavior in Teens (Essay Sample)

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5 May 2017
The Role of Sporting Activities in Preventing Deviant Behavior in Teens
Many teens engage in harmful behaviors such as vandalism, stealing, drug use and violence, which lead to increased school dropout rates. Moreover, these teens may end up in the youth criminal justice system in the form of incarceration. Young people lash out because of factors such as boredom, excitement, peer influence, and drug abuse. Punitive corrective and rehabilitative measures have been shown to be ineffective and expensive. The essence of team and individual sport is to entertain people, but one critical byproduct is prevention of crime, which may be committed by teenagers. This paper argues that sporting activities such as soccer and basketball may help teens steer clear of trouble like malicious damage, shoplifting, theft, breaking and entering, and assault because it improves social support and creates a sense of belonging that causes positive behavioral change among teens.
First, sports can be helpful in minimizing juvenile antisocial behavior, which may be achieved through offering substitute safe opportunities for teens, as well as enhancing meaningful relationships with their peers (Nichols 198). Some authors argue that even though the effects of sports can be influential and transformative to teens, such effects are often indirect and unquantifiable. However, qualitatively, most sporting activities have had a huge impact on young people or would-be offenders. Many pro athletes in major professional leagues in America came from poor socio-economic backgrounds where they were exposed to extreme poverty and associated ills. However, through sports scholarship programs, such players became not only successful athletes, but also role models for many young people in America (Haudenhuyse, Theeboom, and Nols 472; Merkel 152).