161 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group Asian Journal of Education and Training Vol. 6, No. 2, 161-168, 2020 ISSN(E) 2519-5387 DOI: 10.20448/journal.522.2020.62.161.168 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group The Effect of Sport on Life Skills in High School Students Serkan DÜZ1  Tahir Volkan ASLAN2 ( Corresponding Author) 1Inonu University, Faculty of Sports Science, Malatya, Turkey. 2Mersin University, Erdemli Vocational School Department of Travel, Tourism and Entertainment Services, Mersin, Turkey. Abstract Sport has many psychological and social benefits beyond developing physical skills. It can be used to teach young people important life skills such as teamwork, goal setting, problem solving, decision making, leadership, time management, cognitive, emotional, communication and social skills. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of sports on life skills in high school students. The sample of the study consists of 500 high schools students. Turkish version of the Life Skills Scale for Sports (LSSS) developed by Açak and Düz (2018) was used to data collection. The Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis H tests were used for single and multiple comparisons. The level of significance was accepted as p<.05. 61% of the sample was boys and 39% of them was girls. There was significant mean score differences in the subscales of emotional and social skills according to gender variable; in the subscales of leadership and goal-setting according to age variable; in the subscales of leadership, goal setting, emotional and social skills according to type of school variable; in the subscales of time management, leadership, teamwork and goal setting according to club license variable; in the subscales of time management and goal- setting according to the sport-year variable; in the subscales of time management, leadership, emotional skills and goal setting according to the number of training variable. As a conclusion, it was observed that life skills improved through sport in high school students. Keywords: Life skills, Sports, Skill development, Secondary education, Social skills, Personal development. Citation | Serkan DÜZ; Tahir Volkan ASLAN (2020). The Effect of Sport on Life Skills in High School Students. Asian Journal of Education and Training, 6(2): 161-168. History: Received: 11 December 2019 Revised: 21 January 2020 Accepted: 25 February 2020 Published: 23 March 2020 Licensed: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License Publisher: Asian Online Journal Publishing Group Acknowledgement: Both authors contributed to the conception and design of the study. Funding: This study received no specific financial support. Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interests. Transparency: The authors confirm that the manuscript is an honest, accurate, and transparent account of the study was reported; that no vital features of the study have been omitted; and that any discrepancies from the study as planned have been explained. Ethical: This study follows all ethical practices during writing. Contents 1. Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................................... 162 2. Method ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 162 3. Findings ........................................................................................................................................................................................... 163 4. Discussion and Results ................................................................................................................................................................. 166 References ............................................................................................................................................................................................ 167 http://crossmark.crossref.org/dialog/?doi=10.20448/journal.522.2020.62.161.168&domain=pdf&date_stamp=2017-01-14 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ https://www.asianonlinejournals.com/index.php/EDU/article/view/1438 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7611-4838 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5839-1927 https://www.asianonlinejournals.com/index.php/EDU/article/view/1438 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7611-4838 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5839-1927 https://www.asianonlinejournals.com/index.php/EDU/article/view/1438 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7611-4838 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5839-1927 https://www.asianonlinejournals.com/index.php/EDU/article/view/1438 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7611-4838 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5839-1927 Asian Journal of Education and Training, 2020, 6(2): 161-168 162 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group Contribution of this paper to the literature This study contributes to the existing literature by examining the effect of sport on life skills in high school students. 1. Introduction Sport is defined as regular physical activities for different purposes and it is a concept, which is aimed at satisfying the subconscious emotions of human beings, such as integrating set of physical, psychological and mental efforts, and socializing (Eime et al., 2013; Aydemir, 2014). Nowadays, sport is gradually increasing its effect on human life and it is becoming even more important in the society. People now do sports for their personal development as well as their physical and mental abilities. Because there is a strong effect of sport on socializing and strengthening the social ties between individuals in the society. Moreover, it is the most effective form of activity that enables people to prepare for life psychologically and with this aspect contributes to the psychosocial and personal balance (Ghildiyal, 2015). Skill is expressed as physical, cognitive and behavioral competencies that we need in every field of life and it can be learned, developed and corrected as individually or group (Cronin. and Allen, 2015). Life skills discussed as in the literature are also necessary to cope with the demands and difficulties of daily life (Hodge and Danish, 1999) and “enable individuals to be successful in different environments in which they live such as school, home or neighborhood” (Danish et al., 2004). It is also expressed as the necessary competencies for individuals to maintain their existence effectively in the process of change and development (Kolburan and Tosun, 2011). In every society, schools play a proactive role in the development of life skills. Because, life skills enable young people to manage their lives successfully and adapt to different life conditions. Acquisition of life skills in school age can be gathered under many factors such as, ethical behavior, fun, learning to learn, goal setting, self-recognition and self-help, emotion management, career planning, responsibility, accurate perception of time and space, participation, collaboration and teamwork, leadership and respect for differences (Gazda and Brooks Jr, 1985; WHO, 1997; Goldsmith, 2000). Therefore, it is an inevitable necessity for young people to have different types of life skills in order to be able to adapt and succeed in the competitive and constantly changing life conditions. In the last decade, life skills learning through sports has drawn much attention (Gould and Carson, 2008; Holt et al., 2017) and the studies have established links between life skills learning and participation in sports such as leadership, goal setting, communication, and emotional control (Jones and Lavallee, 2009; Johnston et al., 2013). At the same time, it was seen crucial contributions of sportive activities that improved the personality, enhanced the physical and mental health, and developed positive behaviors of the individual (Caterino and Polak, 1999; Kohl and Cook, 2013; Nagaraju, 2016). There had been evidences that most of the skills needed to succeed in sports such as problem solving, time management, goal setting, coping with success and failure, and performing under pressure could be transferred to other living environments (Catalano et al., 2004; Danish et al., 2004). As the role of social representatives in the transfer of life skills is examined, most studies in the sports psychology literature have focused on coaches and which strategies they use to encourage this transfer (Gould et al., 2007; Camiré and Kendellen, 2016; Whitley et al., 2016). It was also known that the interactions of young people with the key social role models such as coaches, parents and peers in the sport played an important role in life skills learning (Gould and Carson, 2008; Holt et al., 2017). At this point, perspective of parents and the attitude of the teachers who spend the most time with the students, who know them, who know their needs and who are responsible for developing their life skills is also very important. Social skills, which are defined as the adapting to the social environment and dealing with conflicts that may occur by using appropriate communication ways (Matson et al., 2007) have a major impact on the healthy interpersonal communication, school and family life of individuals (Hejazi et al., 2017). Moreover, social skills which include behaviors of a child towards other children, such as being able to establish good relationships, respect for the rights and feelings of others, and taking into consideration group norms for convenient social behavior (Cetin et al., 2003) are indicated as a stress protective factor for prevention of drop-out and other problematic behaviors (Korkut, 2004). The way to reach qualitative manpower is to be healthy. Physical education and sports make human will strong, and also play an active role in self-confidence and character formation. Moreover, it facilitates group work and helps people to develop solidarity (Kumar, 2017). During secondary education, in the period when the search for belonging to a social group and finding identity were intense, guiding these needs of the youth in a beneficial and healthy way via physical education and sports will contribute to the process of creating a healthy society and raising generations be attached to national values (Inal, 2003). Basic subjects of life skills comprise the belief of the individual in his/her self-abilities and socialization skills in the society that can demonstrate positive reflections. The acquiring life skills during childhood and youth through sports make this issue even more important because it will prepare them for adulthood. Therefore, the aim of the study was to investigate the effect of sports on the life skills of high school students in terms of various variables. 2. Method In this part of the study, information about the participants and the analysis of the data are presented. 2.1. Research Model Simple random sampling model was used in sample selection. Random sampling is a part of the sampling technique in which each sample has an equal probability of being chosen. 2.2. Population The population of study was formed by approximately 53621 students studying at four different high schools from each district of Mersin in the 2018-2019 academic year. Asian Journal of Education and Training, 2020, 6(2): 161-168 163 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group 2.3. Sample The formula Nt²pq/d²(N-1)+t²pq (Sümbüloğlu and Sümbüloğlu, 2009) was used to determine the sample size that will represent the population. With a 95% confidence interval and 5% sampling error, the sample size of the study was calculated to be at least 383 students, and accordingly, a questionnaire was applied to a group of 550 high school students. Since 26 of the collected questionnaires contain incomplete and 14 of them include conflicting information, they were excluded from the study. As a result, the total of 500 students was included in the study and formed the sample. The characteristics of the participants are given in Table 1. Table-1. Descriptive characteristics of subjects. Variables Parameters N % Age 15 111 22.2 16 190 38 17 129 25.8 18 70 14 Total 500 100 Gender Male 305 61 Female 195 39 School Type Anatolian High School 134 26.8 Business High School 131 26.2 Sports High School 171 34.2 Science High School 64 12.8 Sports Year 0-2 160 32.0 3-5 185 37.0 6-7 81 16.2 ≥8 74 14.8 Number of Weekly Training 2 73 14.6 3 209 41.8 4 108 21.6 ≥5 110 22.0 Sports Branch Individual Sports 153 30.6 Team Sports 347 69.4 Club License Yes 233 46.6 No 267 53.4 Note: Number and percent values of 500 participants. When Table 1 was examined, it was seen that 61% of the participants were male and 39% were female and their ages ranged between 15 and 18. 22.2% of the participants were 15 years old, 38% were 16 years old, 25.8% were 17 years old and 14% were 18 years old and 134 of them studied at Anatolian high school, 131 were vocational high school, 171 were sports high school and 64 of them are science high school students. While 46% of the participants have a club license, 93.8% of them continue their sports activities in the school team. 2.4. Data Collection Tool Ethics committee approval was obtained from the local university after the necessary permissions were obtained from the provincial directorate of national education. Then, informed consent forms were obtained from the parents before the students participated in the study. In order to evaluate the life skills obtained through the sports, Life Skills Scale for Sport (LSSS) which is developed by Cronin and Allen (2017) and adapted to Turkish by Açak and Düz (2018) was used. The scale used consists of 30 items and 7 subscales such as team work, goal setting, time management, emotional skills, communication, social skills and leadership. Each item in the scale is scored on the 5-point Likert scale ranging from “I strongly disagree (1)” to “I totally agree (5)”. The scale can be applied from secondary school to university students, takes 5-10 minutes to complete and there are no reverse scored questions in the scale. 2.5. Data Analysis The data obtained in the study were evaluated using the IBM statistics (SPSS version 25.0, Armonk, NY, USA) windows package program. The normality of the data was tested by Kolmogorov-Smirnov, skewness and kurtosis tests. In groups that did not show normal distribution, While Mann-Whitney U test was used for paired comparisons, Kruskal-Wallis H test was used for multiple comparisons. Moreover, post-hoc test was used to find the source of the difference in multiple comparisons. The results were evaluated in the 95% confidence interval and the level of significance was considered as p<.05. 3. Findings It is seen that mean scores of social and emotional skills subscale of LSSS of female students are significantly higher than that of male students Table 2. There are significant differences in leadership and goal setting subscales of LSSS of the students who participated in the study Table 3. It was seen that the leadership and goal setting mean scores of the 18-year-old students doing sports were lower than those of 15, 16 and 17-years-old students. It was seen that there were significant differences in the subscales of leadership, social skills, emotional skills and goal setting in Table 4. Mean scores of the Anatolian and science high school students were higher than those of business high school students in the leadership subscale, and Anatolian and business high school students were higher than those of sports high school students in the social skills subscale. However, mean scores of the Anatolian and business high school students were lower than those of sport high school students in the emotional Asian Journal of Education and Training, 2020, 6(2): 161-168 164 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group skills subscale. Finally, mean scores of the Anatolian, sport and science high school students were lower than those of business high school students in the goal setting subscale. Table-2. Relationships between the gender and LSSE subscales. Subscales Gender N ±SD z p Time Management Male 305 3.83±.66 -.298 .766 Female 195 3.82±.66 Communication Male 305 3.80±.71 -1.609 .108 Female 195 3.89±.76 Leadership Male 305 3.70±.63 -1.449 .147 Female 195 3.77±.70 Teamwork Male 305 3.89±.68 -.255 .799 Female 195 3.88±.73 Social skills Male 305 3.81±.67 -2.429 .015* Female 195 3.93±.74 Emotional Skills Male 305 3.58±.76 -2.301 .021* Female 195 3.74±.79 Goal-Setting Male 305 3.96±.72 -.149 .881 Female 195 3.95±.81 Note: *p<.05. Table-3. Relationships between the age and LSSE subscales. Subscales Age N ±SD χ2 p Post-Hoc Time Management 15 111 3.84±.62 .488 .922 16 190 3.83±.68 17 129 3.82±.66 18 70 3.81±.69 Communication 15 111 3.81±.66 1.465 .690 16 190 3.80±.81 17 129 3.91±.68 18 70 3.81±.73 Leadership 15a 111 3.80±.68 8.807 .032* d1,2 2.Business High School 131 3.57±.68 3.Sport High School 171 3.69±.84 4.Science High School 64 3.80±.78 Goal-setting 1.Anatolian High School 134 4.03±.70 14.681 .002* 2<1,3,4 2.Business High School 131 3.74±.79 3.Sport High School 171 4.04±.77 4.Science High School 64 4.04±.72 Note: *p<.05. Table-5. Relationships between the club license and LSSE subscales. Subscales Club License N ±SD z p Time Management Yes 233 3.94±.63 3.811 .000* No 267 3.73±.67 Communication Yes 233 3.89±.74 1.679 .093 No 267 3.78±.72 Leadership Yes 233 3.80±.64 2.451 .014* No 267 3.66±.67 Teamwork Yes 233 3.96±.71 2.595 .009* No 267 3.82±.68 Social skills Yes 233 3.89±.68 1.107 .268 No 267 3.83±.72 Emotional Skills Yes 233 3.67±.76 1.071 .284 No 267 3.61±.79 Goal-Setting Yes 233 4.05±.76 .284 .004* No 267 3.88±.75 Note: *p<.05. It was seen that mean scores of students who have club license were significantly higher than those of students who have not in time management, leadership, teamwork and goal setting subscales Table 5. Table-6. Relationships between the sport year and LSSE subscales. Subscale Sport year N ±SD χ2 p Post-hoc Time Management 0-2a 160 3.74±.67 10.426 .015* d>a,b 3-5b 185 3.82±.69 6-7c 81 3.83±.61 ≥8d 74 4.01±.61 Communication 0-2 160 3.82±.74 2.206 .531 3-5 185 3.80±.72 6-7 81 3.83±.76 ≥8 74 3.95±.71 Leadership 0-2 160 3.67±.69 6.941 .074 3-5 185 3.75±.66 6-7 81 3.65±.69 ≥8 74 3.87±.54 Teamwork 0-2 160 3.81±.70 3.712 .294 3-5 185 3.92±.63 6-7 81 3.88±.80 ≥8 74 3.96±.72 Social skills 0-2 160 3.84±.72 2.622 .454 3-5 185 3.88±.66 6-7 81 3.79±.69 ≥8 74 3.92±.76 Emotional skills 0-2 160 3.58±.75 4.235 .237 3-5 185 3.71±.74 6-7 81 3.53±.84 ≥8 74 3.70±.82 Goal-setting 0-2a 160 3.84±.77 9.141 .027* d>a 3-5b 185 4.01±.71 6-7c 81 3.94±.85 ≥8d 74 4.12±.73 Note: *p<.05. There were significant mean differences in time management and goal setting subscales in terms of sport year according to Table 6. In the time management subscale, mean scores of the students who were doing sports for between 0-2 and 3-5 years were significantly lower than those of students who were doing sports for 8 years and more. Moreover, in the goal setting subscale mean score of the students who were doing sports for 8 years and more were significantly higher than those of students who were doing sports for 0-2 years. Asian Journal of Education and Training, 2020, 6(2): 161-168 166 © 2020 by the authors; licensee Asian Online Journal Publishing Group Table-7. Relationships between number of weekly training and LSSE subscales. Subscales Number of Weekly Training N ±SD χ2 p Post-Hoc Time Management 2a 73 3.67±.63 18.205 .000* d>a,b 3b 209 3.75±.67 4c 108 3.90±.65 ≥5d 110 4.01±.62 Communication 2 73 3.72±.82 2.796 .424 3 209 3.81±.70 4 108 3.88±.72 ≥5 110 3.90±.74 Leadership 2a 73 3.51±.74 7.899 .048* a