Early life experiences and adult sports participation.

IntroductionA central- endeavor of social research is the analysis of determinants of anc constraints on behavior patterns. One of the more salient features of social life about which much has been written, and little resolved, has been that of participation. To this end a considerable amount of research has been directed Studies have undertaken the task of determining conditions of joining and not joining, participation and nonparticipation, the scope of activities in whict individuals take part, and the scale of participation (Axelrod, 1956; Hage dorn and Labovitz, 1967; Harry, 1970; Tomeh, 1967). In part, this interest has been a result of changes occurring in society, especially those changes leading to increased leisure time. Changes in income, amount and scheduling of work, and increased urbanization have generated an interest in the potential increase in demand for recreation facilities and a concern for effective use of free time (Clawson and Knetsch, 1963; Neumeyer, 1958; Shafer, 1968; Wippler, 1970).Prior research on leisure participation has exhibited several trends. First, there has been little differentiation with regard to types of participation. Populations were studied with respect to participation in general, and descriptive breakdowns were provided to show who participated in which activities. Second, there has been a considerable amount of research treating personal and social characteristics such as age, sex, marital status, stage of life cycle, income, residence, and education as determinants of participation (Jordan, 1963; Shafer, 1965; Spaulding, 1970). As Smith (1966: 249) has indicated, though, approaching participation by way of social and personal characteristics represent progress but is an "inadequate and unsatisfactory stopping point." And, third, present and past situational determinants of recreation participation have been largely ignored.1In this paper our research focuses on two specific outdoor activities: hunting and fishing. The concern is not with establishing the fact of participation but with examining the relation of some early-life experiences to current level of adult participation in these sports.Theoretical FrameworkOur theoretical focus is guided by the social scientist's recognition that much of what occurs in adult life stems from participation in social forms and institutions during childhood and from the transmission of values and attitudes of parents and other groups in which individuals are members (Broom and Selznick, 1970: 84). The internalization of these early experiences has been termed socialization. Socializing experiences, or conditions of previous experience, are felt to be important to recreation because they are factors in an individual's background which may predispose him toward certain future action. The suggestion here is that, as in other areas of daily life, early orientations toward sports may persist into adult life, influencing both the types of recreation one chooses to participate in and the extent of his participation. For our sample of hunters and fishermen, we operationalize the above socializing influences in terms of three childhood antecedents: residence during youth, source of introduction to sports, and frequency of participation during youth.2By way of elaboration on the above influences, one might argue that hunting and fishing are rural sports into which youths are introduced at an early age and are participated in more frequently by rural youth. With the increased urbanization that has occurred over the past few decades and the accompanying migration from rural to urban areas, hunting and fishing may diminish in importance and in the future lose some of their appeal to urban youth, if the effect of rural background during youth is, in fact, important to adult participation (Hendee, 1969; Copp, 1964). Similarly, being introduced to hunting and fishing by one's parents may be important for participation during youth as well as for participation later in life. …