Journal article
Breaking down participation in sport and physical recreation for children with disabilities: what it means and what can be seen
Sport Sciences for Health, Vol.21(3), pp.1495-1512
2025
Abstract
BackgroundMeasuring participation in sport and physical recreation is important to identify children with low participation and to measure the effectiveness of interventions. This study aims to break down what participation in sport and physical recreation means in a way that is inclusive of children with disability, focussing on how observers such as families, coaches or health professionals might be able to identify, quantify, and describe the sport or physical recreation participation of a child with disability.MethodsAdults with lived experience of childhood-onset disability, rehabilitation practitioners, and sports/recreation professionals and volunteers completed a Delphi study to clarify definitions of sport/physical recreation and identify potential indicators of participation in sport/physical recreation for children with disabilities. Consensus was defined as >= 70% agreement. Questions were added in subsequent rounds to refine items not reaching agreement or with suggested modifications.ResultsRespondents (n = 29) agreed on definitions of sport and physical recreation consistent with Sports Australia definitions, as well as detailed descriptors of type, level and environmental context of activities. Respondents also agreed on items that may be indicators of participation (attendance and involvement) to someone observing.ConclusionFindings provide insight into how sport/physical recreation participation is perceived and could be measured in a comprehensive participation assessment tool for children with disabilities. Future research should be conducted with larger populations to confirm findings, investigate the relationship between proxy indicators and individuals' experience of involvement, and pilot test any subsequent assessment tool.
Details
- Title
- Breaking down participation in sport and physical recreation for children with disabilities: what it means and what can be seen
- Authors
- Samantha Lee - Charles Sturt UniversityMichael Curtin - Charles Sturt UniversityGeorgina Clutterbuck (Corresponding Author) - Charles Sturt University
- Publication details
- Sport Sciences for Health, Vol.21(3), pp.1495-1512
- Publisher
- Springer Milano
- Date published
- 2025
- DOI
- 10.1007/s11332-025-01366-1
- ISSN
- 1825-1234
- Copyright note
- This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
- Organisation Unit
- School of Health - Nursing; School of Health - Physiotherapy
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 991266195202621
- Output Type
- Journal article
Metrics
1 Record Views