Your Life in Sport from God's Perspective - Survey Results

Below are some of the results from the Topics/ Issues re: Your life in Sport from God’s perspective as completed by several dozen student-athletes from 14-22 years of age in high schools and Division I universities. (Southern Illinois University and Virginia Tech University)

 

On a sheet with 86 issues / topics, we asked them to circle ten of greatest interest to them and then to put an * by their top three issues / topics. The survey is attached if you’d like to use it for your own research locally.

 

Topic / Issue and number of times circled:

Consistency 18

Work Ethic 16

Leadership 16

Courage 16

Attitude 16

Commitment 16

Faith 15

Patience 15

Disappointment 15

Success 15

Perfectionism 14

Injury 14

 

Topic / Issue and number of *s:

Consistency 8

Success 8

Leadership 8

Patience 7

Faith 6

Perfectionism 6

Disappointment 6

Injury 6

Balance 5

Work Ethic 5

Heart 5

Playing w/ Purpose 5

Fear 5

66 issues received at least one *

 

8 Issues / Topics appear in both lists, hinting at their importance (they are underscored above). It would seem that those issues / topics with the greatest frequency and greatest intensity should be those we address in our ministries.

Some of these results are very interesting. The circles indicate frequency of interest in these issues. There were 86 issues on the sheet and only 2 were never circled or *ed. I believe the *s indicate intensity of interest in these issues. Note that “Consistency” is at the top of both lists. This intrigues me because I think they hear “Consistency” and think “Integrity.” I perceive that many of these young people are conflicted between who they are at FCA meetings and who they are on the field of competition, in the classroom, at home, with their friends, at church, etc… They sense the dissonance and it feels like inconsistency.

 

The only two issues on the sheet with exactly 0 circles or *s were: “Performance-enhancing drugs” and “Kindness.” That either means they’re not issues for them, that they already know what God thinks about them or that they don’t want to know what God thinks about them.