Explaining Pain and Injury Attitudes and Experiences in Sport in Terms of Gender, Race, and Sports Status Factors

This article presents data from a survey of college athletes in a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I athletic program showing how well gender, race, and 4 sports status variables (team or individual sports participation, contact or noncontact sports participation, status as a lineup regular, and status as an athletic scholarship holder) explain differences in sports-related pain and injury attitudes and experiences. Attitude was measured by 3 scales—concerning toughness, rational choice in decisions about playing hurt, and pressure from coaches and fans to play while hurt—which were constructed for this study. Injury experience measures indicated whether the college athletes had lingering effects from sports injuries, how many sports injuries they had sustained, how many times they had had surgery for sports injuries, and how long they were disabled by their most serious sports injury. Gender, race, status as a lineup regular, and status as a scholarship holder were found to explain variations in attitudinal or experiential factors, with gender explaining more of these differences than any other variable. Thus gender is given special emphasis in the discussion of findings.