Rasa Kreivytė

Aggression and violence among youth are researched as social phenomena in sport. This paper was designed to determine the occurrence of these behaviors as well as prosocial behaviors among young athletes. The current paper is a research report aiming to detect the frequency of aggressive behavior, social exclusion, prosocial behavior and cohesion in the youth environment, the frequency of personal experience of peer violence or social exclusion, and to evaluate cross-national differences in terms of occurrence of these phenomena.The field research was conducted in six European countries (Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Italy, Lithuania, and Serbia) on a sample of 482 children aged 6 to 16. The conducted questionnaire consisted of pre-existing scales and measures for specific behaviors and social aspects that formed the Youth Environment Assessment and Youth Characteristics Questionnaire. Previous personal experience of violence and social exclusion determined groups in the sample. One-way ANOVA and discriminant analysis were conducted to compare various variables and groups within the sample. The results have shown that aggressive and social exclusion behaviors are rare or very rare, predominantly in the form of verbal aggression in the sports club environment. The results of the conducted discriminant analysis indicate that prosocial and cohesion behaviors occur “quite often” to “often” among sports club athletes’ samples. The percentage of athletes who have had personal experience of violence or social exclusion in the last two years and whose feeling of hurt by that experience was assessed as “a lot” or “fully” on the measurement scale is estimated to be approximately 25%. Mild cross-national differences emerged in the overmentioned variables, probably due to the sample specificity, or to cultural variety. The results indicate the need for longitudinal research on this topic since the sport is an environment in which cohesion can be developed among young athletes, but it is not free from social exclusion or aggression.

Sport Against Violence and Exclusion (SAVE), a project cofounded by the Erasmus + Program of the European Union, seeks to prevent violent and socially exclusive behaviors through physical activity. The current editorial shows a range of possible interpretations of these two phenomena from both a psychological and sociological point of view, offering helpful methods to coaches who train children (ages 6 to 12)in grass-root sport clubs. Following a thorough analysis, partners from seven EU countries (Lithuania, Italy, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Austria, and Spain) will be able to identify skills and techniques for coaches to ensure inclusive training methods as well as to provide them with effective conflict resolution tools. Furthermore, both trainers and parents will have access to an online platform with useful information regarding these issues.

Background. Soccer is known as one of the most popular games in the world. Because of constant profiling and improving, players and their conditioning abilities need to be on top level to achieve great sport results. The aim of this study was to determine conditioning profile of junior players playing on different playing positions. Methods. Sample of 85 junior elite soccer players (17.06 ± 0.74 years) was included in the study (height: 1.75 ± 0.05 m; weight: 73.59 ± 9.56 kg; body mass index: 23.97 ± 0.45 kg/cm 2 ). Sample of variables consisted of five motor ability tests (standing long jump-SLJ, high jump-HJ, 30 m sprint-SP30M, 60 m sprint-SP60M, 5 x 10 m sprint-SP5 x 10M) and one functional ability test (1500 m run-R1500M). To determine significant differences among players playing on different playing positions and to establish where those differences were, one-way ANOVA with Scheffe post-hoc test were used. For better understanding, which tests distinguish each position the most, discriminant analysis was performed. Results. Results showed that the sample which consisted of five groups (defenders, goalkeepers, attackers, stoppers and midfielders), significantly differed in variable SLJ (p = .00). Scheffe post-hoc test significant differences between defenders and goalkeepers (p = .01), goalkeepers and stoppers (p = .00) and goalkeepers and midfielders (p = .01). Conclusions. Results clearly represented homogenous collective, where players, no matter which position they were, had similar values in obtained tests. The explanation of obtained results could be found in similar preparedness and great sports form, which must be on optimal level for best performance.Keywords: motor abilities, functional abilities, preparedness.