Youth Sports and Head Injuries
As one of the seven psychologists in this district who received the additional training required to conduct evaluations for Traumatic Brain Injury, I'm always interested in new research on this topic. In case you missed it, this article from The New York Times summarizes information from a recent student from Boston University on youth football. While we know that many of our students in WS/FCS are exceptional athletes and that sports can be an important part of the school and community, this study highlights some risks that may associated with contact sports at a young age.
The researchers studied 214 former American football players who are now all in their 50s. The participants completed telephone-administered cognitive tests and online measures of depression, behavioral regulation, apathy and executive functioning (e.g., initiating activity, problem-solving, planning and organization, etc.). The researchers then compared the results of former players who started playing tackle football before the age of 12 against those who started playing at age 12 or later.
Results revealed that participation in youth football "before age 12 increased the risk of problems with behavioral regulation, apathy and executive functioning by two-fold and increased the risk of clinically elevated depression scores by three-fold." The researchers chose the cutoff of age 12 because the brain undergoes a key period of development and maturation between the years 10-12 in males. However, even when a specific age cutoff was not used, the researches found that "younger age of first exposure to football was associated with worse clinical function."
Michael Alosco, PhD, lead author of the study and a post-doctoral fellow at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) reports that "this study adds to growing research suggesting that incurring repeated head impacts through tackle football before the age of 12 can lead to a greater risk for short- and long-term neurological consequences."
You may recall that Wake Forest University conducted similar research that was published in 2016. They found that "youth football players may develop changes in their brains over the course of a single season" and that there was a "significant relationship between head impact exposure and changes in the brain’s white matter."
On Sunday, there was a front-page story in our local Winston-Salem Journal entitled "Study Finds About 20 Percent of Youths Have Experienced a Concussion. Of those, 5.5% reporting being diagnosed more than once with a concussion.
What are your thoughts on these research findings?
The researchers studied 214 former American football players who are now all in their 50s. The participants completed telephone-administered cognitive tests and online measures of depression, behavioral regulation, apathy and executive functioning (e.g., initiating activity, problem-solving, planning and organization, etc.). The researchers then compared the results of former players who started playing tackle football before the age of 12 against those who started playing at age 12 or later.
Results revealed that participation in youth football "before age 12 increased the risk of problems with behavioral regulation, apathy and executive functioning by two-fold and increased the risk of clinically elevated depression scores by three-fold." The researchers chose the cutoff of age 12 because the brain undergoes a key period of development and maturation between the years 10-12 in males. However, even when a specific age cutoff was not used, the researches found that "younger age of first exposure to football was associated with worse clinical function."
Michael Alosco, PhD, lead author of the study and a post-doctoral fellow at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) reports that "this study adds to growing research suggesting that incurring repeated head impacts through tackle football before the age of 12 can lead to a greater risk for short- and long-term neurological consequences."
You may recall that Wake Forest University conducted similar research that was published in 2016. They found that "youth football players may develop changes in their brains over the course of a single season" and that there was a "significant relationship between head impact exposure and changes in the brain’s white matter."
On Sunday, there was a front-page story in our local Winston-Salem Journal entitled "Study Finds About 20 Percent of Youths Have Experienced a Concussion. Of those, 5.5% reporting being diagnosed more than once with a concussion.
What are your thoughts on these research findings?
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