Sam Elliott

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Associate Professor at Flinders University

Involvement in organized sport can be highly demanding for young athletes who encounter many difficult situations and stressors. This can be exacerbated among youth athletes who have been recruited into talent-identification youth sport programs. Given that there are a range of negative consequences that can result when talent-identified (TI) youth...

Increasing girls’ participation in organised sport in Australia represents an elusive challenge for most sporting codes. Girls encounter a range of barriers and obstacles that serve to discourage initial and ongoing participation in youth sport. One setting that has flourished is Australian football, coinciding with the establishment of a professio...

Objectives The purpose of this study was to explore parents’ and coaches’ perceptions about educational video resources to support parents’ involvement in youth soccer. Design Using an instrumental, qualitative case study design, 21 parents and coaches were recruited to participate in an individual interview. All participants were involved in one...

Background COVID-19 continues to represent the single biggest challenge to contemporary community sport globally. Compliance with social distancing policies, strict return-to-play protocols, and COVID-19 specific training has, perhaps, forever changed the way that children and young people engage in organised sport. Within this context, and while m...

Youth sport participation, retention, and dropout are well-established areas of academic interest in the interdisciplinary field of sport. However, terminology, definitions, and conceptualisations of participation vary significantly within the literature. This variation can potentially lead to inadvertent misreporting or deliberate manipulation of...

Despite the well-documented health, social and economic benefits of sports participation, adults’ participation in organised sport declines as age increases. To date, no review has summarised the multi-level factors that influence adults’ decisions to participate in sport. Therefore, this systematic literature review aimed to: 1) determine the faci...

Background Young people are disproportionately affected by poor mental health. Youth sport settings hold immense potential to improve the mental health outcomes of this demographic. Efforts to leverage youth sport settings to promote mental health are limited by the lack of knowledge pertaining to engagement with mental health interventions in thes...

In contemporary society, parents enrol children into organised sport from as young as three years of age. Although the benefits of sport participation are well documented, it is important to acknowledge early sport involvement can also prompt an increase injury risk, psychological burnout and/or sport dropout. Yet little is known about why parents...

Understanding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on parental involvement in youth sport is largely unknown. The objective of the study presented in this paper was to understand parental involvement in relation to their child’s participation in organised sport during the COVID-19 pandemic. Using an interpretive descriptive methodology, online quali...

This study investigated the impact of Coronavirus Disease of 2019 (COVID-19) restrictions on perceived health and wellbeing of young Australian sport and physical activity participants. A survey was conducted during the first COVID-19 restrictions and lockdowns in Australia (May–June 2020). Health measures were tabulated against five respondent cha...

The aim of this study was to determine the impact of COVID-19 restrictions on older adults’ perceived health and well-being according to different types of participation in sport and physical activity by gender and region. A survey was implemented during the first COVID-19 lockdown in Australia (June 2020) and information collected on demographics,...

The purpose of this paper was to explore the implications of the increasing range of sporting opportunities for girls and young females on traditional female sports such as netball. This paper emerged from a larger investigation and provided a qualitative descriptive account of the implications for netball based on individual interview and focus gr...

Individuals’ access to sport and physical activity has been hampered due to COVID-19 lockdown restrictions. In Australia participation in community sport was cancelled during lockdowns. There is limited research on the impact of sport participation restrictions on the health and wellbeing of adults. Aim The aim of this study was to investigate the...

In Australia, and throughout the world, it is evident that the mental health and wellbeing of young males aged 15–24, is not a priority. In Australia suicide is the leading cause of death in people aged 15–24 years and 75% are male (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Australian hospital statistics 2011–12, 2021). It is clear young males as...

Extensive research recognises the complex and often conflictual nature of parents and coaches involvement in youth sport. There are very few accounts that deeply explore the nature of parent and coach relationships in the current stock of literature, even less so from a sociocultural perspective. This is significant given that the behaviours of par...

Girls' and young women's engagement and disengagement in physical activity has been well documented in Western culture. Sport plays a pivotal role in the development of behaviours that promote physical activity, particularly through commitment to team and individual goal attainment, socialisation, and feelings of belonging and self-identity. Commun...

The Marion Swimming Club received funding through the 2020-21 Sport and Recreation Development and Inclusion Program, administered by the Office for Recreation, Sport and Racing, to implement a development and leadership program for girls and young women from the club. This report evaluates the Performance with Purpose program and provides insights...

In this paper, we seek to open a dialogue about the approach of co-interviewing, which, to our surprise, has not received much attention in the realm of qualitative social research. The co-interviewing approach stands apart from ‘multiple’ interviewing, in which two or more researchers are tasked with conducting interviews in a single research stud...

A fundamental step in describing a research field is the review and synthesis of accumulated knowledge. Multiple qualitative reviews have been conducted over the last decade to provide a summary and commentary on the growing literature in the area of youth sport parenting. However, these reviews have focused on contemporary findings in the field, l...

Qualitative studies have the potential to evoke emotional distress among participants, particularly where sensitive issues are explored. Consequently, novice qualitative researchers become well versed in strategies to minimise risk to participants. But what happens to the novice researcher when they are confronted with the emotional account of a pa...

This is a paper based on research with the LGBTIQ+ community in South Australia, the likes of which has not been conducted previously in the state. The paper, which utilized both quantitative (n = 148) and qualitative (n = 31) research methods identifies the key issues that the LGBTIQ+ community face with respect to sporting involvement. There were...

Sports participation is associated with many physical and psychosocial benefits yet a large proportion of children, especially girls, are not participating in or dropping out of sport. Netball is a popular sporting choice for girls; however, it has experienced a decrease in girls’ participation according to census data in Australia. This study aime...

This conceptual / study protocol paper provides important context around the role of sport in Australia where sport provides aspects of community agency through participation, organisation and volunteerism. It provides a descriptive analysis of how sport assists young people in developing physical and mental “fitness” through its community orientat...

This conceptual/study protocol paper provides important context around the role of sport in Australia where sport provides aspects of community agency through participation, organisation and volunteerism. It provides a descriptive analysis of how sport assists young people in developing physical and mental ”fitness” through its community orientatio...

In Australian culture, males dominate sports such as football, cricket and Australian Rules Football. Girls and women in such sports are frequently required to negotiate persistent gender constructs and stereotypes. Despite this, in recent years there has been an increase in girls’ participation in sports that are constructed as masculine. The pres...

Introduction: Agility has become an increasingly important attribute to assess among athletes within performance testing protocols. Currently implemented agility tests lack perceptual and decision-making attributes associated with the construct. These are important aspects to address given that performance testing can monitor progressive improveme...

This is the first South Australia to identify barriers and enablers in sport for the LGBTIQ+ community. The findings and recommendations will help to advance a holistic approach for reducing homophobia and ‘homohysteria’ within sporting environments. The report provides contextually-informed evidence for creating, maintaining and enhancing inclus...

As novice researchers, doctoral students undertaking qualitative research become well-versed in strategies that should be adopted to minimise risk to participants. But what happens when a researcher is confronted with the complex, emotional account of a participant? Despite the consistent emphasis on participant safety, many doctoral students are n...

There has been increasing academic interest in understanding the nature of parental involvement in youth sport. Much scholarly focus has illuminated both positive and negative forms of sport parenting from the perspectives of coaches, parents and youth participants. One less understood aspect however surrounds the potentially conflicting role of pa...

There has been increasing academic interest in understanding the nature of parental involvement in youth sport. Much scholarly focus has illuminated both positive and negative forms of sport parenting from the perspectives of coaches, parents and youth participants. One less understood aspect however surrounds the potentially conflicting role of pa...

Problems surrounding parental involvement in youth sport have received much attention in the international academic community. Most of the focus has surrounded the frequency and nature of parental verbal behaviour such as criticism, swearing and abuse. While such behaviour has the potential to exert a negative influence in youth sport, little is kn...

Background Men’s health has been subjected to diverse approaches to research over the past two decades. Much of the literature has focused on specific medical and health issues. Other contributions have focused more broadly on masculinities and its relationship to health. It is arguable that there has not been a lot of attention paid to Australian...

There is a widely held belief that sport participation inherently enhances health among children and youth. Such a perception often motivates parents to encourage children’s initial and ongoing involvement in organised sport and physical activity. While sport certainly comprises an important vehicle for accruing physical activity, the sport environ...

The Flinders-Panthers Be Your Best project was developed as a result of a successful and effective union between Flinders University and the South Adelaide Football Club, colloquially known as ‘the Panthers’. The aim of the project was to implement and evaluate, in an area of high social deprivation, an in-school health promotion programme for prim...

Junior Australian Football leagues typically adopt rules and positional arrangements that mimic the adult version of Australian Football. This involves fielding 18 players per team on a full-sized oval. While such competition structures are appropriate for adult competition and elite athletes, modifications to field dimensions and number of players...

Each of the authors of this chapter has been, or is currently, lecturing in the area of sport and society to undergraduate Sport Science or Health and Physical Education students. At some point, usually early on the course, we have asked these students to reflect on the meaning of sport in contemporary society. The responses have been many and vari...

It is well documented that parents can comprise a significant positive influence in the youth sport setting. Parents are often acknowledged for providing support and encouragement in addition to the necessary financial and logistical support that enables sporting opportunities. However, there is also a concern that parents possess the potential to...

This research compared the effects of altering the number of players and the dimensions of the playing area on the possession characteristics in youth (under-14) Australian football. A modified ‘small sided game’ (SSG) 12-a-side version was compared to the full field ‘adult’ 18-a-side game. Games were video recorded and the possession characteristi...

Characteristic issues surrounding parents in youth sport include examples of negative verbal and non-verbal behaviour demonstrated during competition. Numerous studies have done well to highlight while parents possess a great potential for positively influencing the sport experience, they can also exert a considerable negative influence by engaging...

The junior Australian football landscape has been frequently linked to reports of undesirable parental behaviour, yet sufficient understanding around this potential socio-cultural issue remains limited. In light of this paucity, the study presented within this paper makes a unique contribution to the broad field of parent–sport literature by offeri...

The contemporary concept of health literacy has received heightened attention within the academic community over the last decade. Health literacy, which is related to the acquisition, understanding and application of health-related information (Jordan, Buchbinder & Osborne 2010) is particularly important where parents and children are concerned. Pa...