Are relative age effects pervasive in lower competitive tiers of school sports? An investigation of student-athletes from Minas Gerais
Abstract
This study investigated the Relative Age Effect (RAE) in school athletes, according to sex and age categories. Birthdates from 1356 male and 1044 female athletes (aged 9 to 17 years) who played scholar competitions in Minas Gerais-Brazil in 2018 and/or 2019 in categories Under-11, Under-14 and/or Under-17 were analyzed. Athletes were divided into quarters according to their month of birth: Q1 (January-March), Q2 (April-June), Q3 (July-September), and Q4 (October-December). Chi-squared tests were performed to verify the presence of RAE. The significance level was set at 5%. The observed distribution was different from expected when all athletes were analyzed together (p = 0.019; ⍵ = 0.06), and in males when athletes were analyzed separately by sex (p = 0.017; ⍵ = 0.09). Athletes born in the three first months of the year were more frequent in both cases (p < 0.008). The age category analyses indicated uneven distribution of births in Under-11 category (p < 0.001; ⍵ = 0.25), where athletes born in Q1 and Q2 were more frequent (p < 0.001). When age category and sex were considered together, it was observed that athletes born in Q1 were more frequent than athletes born in Q3 (p < 0.002) and Q4 (p < 0.001) in the U-11 category regardless of sex (p < 0.002), but not in the Under-14 and Under-17 categories. Considering that school sport can be the first step towards achieving higher competitive levels, it is important to instruct coaches about RAE, in order to reduce inequalities in the access to school sport.
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