Respect: Results of a pilot project designed to improve behaviour in English football

The research on which this article reports arose from recognition by The English Football Association (FA) that poor behaviour in affiliated football was having widespread and deleterious effects on the game, at every level, including a loss of about 7,000 referees each year. In order to address these concerns, The FA implemented a programme of pro-social behaviour change, branded ‘Respect’, and commissioned research into a 3 month pilot project in a small number of County FAs during the spring of 2008. In designing the evaluation for the Respect Pilot the researchers attempted to adhere to best practice in programme evaluation by addressing both the process and outcomes of the intended change programme (Coalter, 2007; Pawson, 2006; Weiss, 1998) and by working with a logic model that could be adapted over time (Aspen Institute, 2003; Schmitz and Parsons, 2007). The four main stakeholder groups identified to take part in the Pilot were players, coaches, referees and spectators/parents, for three age groups – Under 10, Under 16 and Open Age. Three different interventions were tested at the matches: designated spectator areas, codes of conduct with sanctions and only the captain being allowed to talk to the referee. Interviews were conducted with the four stakeholder groups at three games in each age group. In addition, week-by-week behaviour assessments from 583 trial games were entered online by over 1,000 people. Overall, both enjoyment and behaviour scores among the Active (experimental) teams were perceived to be significantly better than that among the matched Control teams (with no interventions). The experimental teams also ranked all three interventions highly over the ten weeks, with the designated spectator areas rated best, followed by the signing of codes of practice second and only captains talking to referees third. The results are discussed in relation to the future plans for the Respect campaign and the efficacy of the original logic model

The Football Association’s Child Protection in Football Research Project 2002-2006: Rationale, design and first year results

In common with most sport organisations, the English Football Association has come relatively recently to the issue of child protection. Abuses of various kinds have been known about in the sport for many years but, until the late 1990s, very little systematic work was undertaken to address this. The launch of a Child Protection Strategy by the Engalish FA in May 2000 reflected recognition by those in authority within the sport that child abuse and protection were properly the subject of football policy and should become embedded in all aspects of the affiliated game. In addition to adopting child protection, the then-Chief Executive Officer of the FA made a commitment to evidence-based policy in his strategic plan for the game. In line with this commitment, the FA commissioned a 5 year study of the impact of child protection on the game, the first year of which constituted an audit of the state of child protection in the affiliated game. Data were collected through 11 internet surveys, 32 club case studies, over 200 interviews with various stakeholders and an analysis of 132 case files for child abuse referrals. This paper sets out the context of child protection in sport more generally and the background to the FA's child protection reseach project in particular. It also presents selected first year results for key stakeholder groups

Measuring the impact of child protection through Activation States

Child protection (CP) has risen to the top of the UK sports policy agenda in the past four years and the Football Association has invested in this major strategy as part of its commitment to “use the power of football to build a better future” (FA, 2000a). Evidencing the impact of child protection is, however, a complex task, exacerbated by the dearth of measurement tools that exist for this purpose in sport. This article presents a new model of ‘Activation States’ that has been designed and used to measure shifts in football culture as child protection has begun to impact upon the sport. The model is used to map changes over time related to the knowledge, feelings, actions and discourses of key stakeholders in football. The research for which the model was designed is a longitudinal study, commissioned by the English Football (soccer) Association, on the impact of the organisation’s child protection strategy on the culture of soccer. Sample data from the project are used to illustrate the model and to examine its potential and limitations as a tool for measuring impacts in child protection and other social inclusion themes

Child Exploitation and the FIFA World Cup: A review of risks and protective interventions

This review was commissioned by the Child Abuse Programme (CAP) of Oak Foundation, a large international philanthropic organisation. It forms part of CAP’s effort to win societal rejection of practices such as the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents around major sporting events (MSEs), and to embed prevention and protection from exploitation as a permanent concern for global sports-related bodies. This review is intended to inform action in countries that host MSEs and to provide some suggestions on how hosting countries can avoid past pitfalls and mistakes in relation to child exploitation, especially economic and sexual exploitation. Importantly, it also acts as a call to action by those responsible for commissioning and staging MSEs, such as FIFA and the IOC, to anticipate, prepare for and adopt risk mitigation strategies and interventions. Positive leadership from these culturally powerful bodies could prove decisive in shifting hearts, minds and actions in the direction of improved safety for children

Defining appropriateness in coach-athlete sexual relationships: The voice of coaches

The sporting culture, with omnipotent coaches, fierce competition for recognition and funding, and ‘win at all cost’ ethos, creates an environment conducive to sexual exploitation of athletes. Recent increased public awareness and the development of child protection policies in sport have led to the questioning of previously accepted coach-athlete relationships. This study is an exploratory investigation into male swimming coaches’ perceptions of appropriateness of coach-athlete sexual relationships. Sexual relationships with athletes under the age of 16 were unanimously considered totally inappropriate. With regard to sexual relationships with athletes above the age of consent for heterosexual sex, opinions ranged from “totally inappropriate” to “it’s a question of civil liberties.” These results are discussed in relation to how coaches have adapted their own behaviours in the face of public scrutiny but are still reluctant to restrict the rights of their fellow coaches

Sexual harassment and abuse in sport: The research context

This special issue of the Journal of Sexual Aggression draws on the contributions to a Symposium on ‘Sexual Harassment in Sport – Challenges for Sport Psychology in the New Millennium’, held at the Xth Congress of the International Society for Sport Psychology, Skiathos, Greece from May 28th to June 2nd 2001. The symposium, which was organised by the authors of this editorial, was intended to move forward the international research agenda on sexual harassment and abuse in sport and to examine professional practice issues for sport psychologists. It was clear from the attendance of over 60 delegates at that symposium that international interest in this subject is growing. Further evidence of this came from the attendance of 26 members states – from Azerbaijan to Sweden - at a Council of Europe seminar on The Protection of Children, Young People and Women in Sport, held in Helsinki in September 2001

The HIV-1 protective-35SNP effect in Caucasians is CD8 T cell mediated

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Reducing training frequency from 3 or 4 sessions/week to 2 sessions/week does not attenuate improvements in maximal aerobic capacity with reduced-exertion high-intensity interval training (REHIT)

In the present randomised-controlled trial we investigated the effect of REHIT training frequency (2/3/4 sessions/week for 6 weeks) on maximal aerobic capacity (V̇O2max) in 42 inactive individuals (13 women; mean±SD age: 25±5 y, V̇O2max: 35±5 mL·kg-1·min-1). Changes in V̇O2max were not significantly different between the three groups (2 sessions/week: +10.2%; 3 sessions/week: +8.1%; 4 sessions per week: +7.3%). In conclusion, a training frequency of 2 sessions/week is sufficient for REHIT to improve V̇O2max. We demonstrate that reducing REHIT training frequency from 3 or 4 to 2 sessions/week does not attenuate improvements in the key health marker of V̇O2max. Key words: V̇O2max; sprint interval training; SIT; Wingate sprint; exercise; healt

IntFOLD: an integrated web resource for high performance protein structure and function prediction

The IntFOLD server provides a unified resource for the automated prediction of: protein tertiary structures with built-in estimates of model accuracy (EMA), protein structural domain boundaries, natively unstructured or disordered regions in proteins, and protein–ligand interactions. The component methods have been independently evaluated via the successive blind CASP experiments and the continual CAMEO benchmarking project. The IntFOLD server has established its ranking as one of the best performing publicly available servers, based on independent official evaluation metrics. Here, we describe significant updates to the server back end, where we have focused on performance improvements in tertiary structure predictions, in terms of global 3D model quality and accuracy self-estimates (ASE), which we achieve using our newly improved ModFOLD7 rank algorithm. We also report on various upgrades to the front end including: a streamlined submission process, enhanced visualization of models, new confidence scores for ranking, and links for accessing all annotated model data. Furthermore, we now include an option for users to submit selected models for further refinement via convenient push buttons

Contourite porosity, grain size and reservoir characteristics

Acknowledgements Many people are to thank for the collection and release of the data used in this study. In particular, we thank the captain, officers and crew, and the scientific and technical shipboard parties of the different IODP expeditions utilised. We each thank our respective institutes for their ongoing support. Xiaohang Yu acknowledges financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41976067).Peer reviewedPostprin