The prevalence of youth sport specialization: A literature review

Many claim youth athletes are specializing at a greater rate than ever before. However, there is a scarcity of empirical evidence to support this idea. The purpose of this literature review was to disclose prior empirical findings pertaining to the prevalence of youth sport specialization. Articles were included in this review if they used the three-point specialization scale to determine youth athletes’ specialization status. Six articles from three journals met these criteria. Of the six articles included in this review, the mean ages of the observed athletes ranged from 13.7–16.1. Approximately 29.55% of the 5696 youth athletes included in this review were high-level specialization athletes. However, this finding should be interpreted with caution given the scarcity of research on this topic and the various factors shown to influence specialization rates. The findings suggest roughly 30% of youth athletes between the ages of 13 and 18 are highly specialized. However, future research is warranted due to the lack of research on this topic. Future research should survey a large and diverse group of youth athletes. This research should utilize the three-point specialization scale to determine the relationship between children’s specialization status and children’s sport type, age, school size, and location.