Participation in sports has many positive impacts, such as maintaining fitness, creating socialization platforms to form new connections, maintaining perfect health, and reducing stress. However, some sports events are usually accompanied by aggressive behaviors, which makes their outcomes harm society's functioning. Aggression can be described as the intention to psychologically, physically, or verbally harm a person. Aggression can either be instrumental or hostile. Hostile aggression is actions activated by anger and specially directed towards hurting an individual. Instrumental aggression involves engaging in violent actions against an individual with an aim above that of injuring the other person ( Sofia & Cruz, 2017 ). For instance, becoming more vigorous on the field to develop fear in the opponent team, hoping that the move will increase the probability of winning is an example of Instrumental aggression. Players, parents at children sporting events, and spectators are the common participants in aggressive behaviors in sports. Purposely, the paper intends to discuss factors behind aggression in sports and their impacts on the field and society.
Although aggression in sports is, in most cases, viewed to have negative impacts, it sometimes helps in improving performance, which makes it positive in some cases. Positive aggression can be described as assertive behavior where a player abides by the sport's rules but plays with high intensity with no intentions of harming the opponent. Such aggression is considered positive since it helps a team to gain results using ethically approved techniques. On most occasions, positive aggression has been confused with negative aggression because of the inappropriate measurement of violent acts. Some ways to measure aggression in sports events include coach ratings, number of fouls, behavior observation, and penalty records ( Fatma, Khan & Husain, 2017 ). For instance, a team with the highest number of fouls is considered to have more aggressive players than a team with fewer fouls. Penalties are also given to the opposing team when a player commits a foul. Therefore, more penalties indicate higher aggression. When aggression measures are clearly defined and understood, a clear difference can be drawn between positive and negative aggression in sports.
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Examples of Aggression in Sports
Player aggression can involve heating an opponent player with the stick on the head in a hockey match to prevent him from scoring. In most cases, aggressive behavior's impact determines whether legal actions are taken against the offender or not. One incident occurred between Donald Brashear and Marty McSorley, Canadian National League Hockey players, where McSorley hit Brashear on the head with a stick leading to a concussion. The behavior attracted a whole season suspension in addition to assault charges by the Vancouver police.
Parental violence at youths' sports events is a common occurrence in American society. One of the most common cases that show parent aggression was Massachusetts's incident in 2000. Michael Costin and Thomas Junta, parents, started arguing during hockey practice, which resulted in a fight, leading to Costin's death.
Spectator aggression is more common than both players' and parents' hostility. Violence is commonly experienced during championships in basketball, football, and baseball—spectators' aggression results in injuries, property damage, arrests, and on some occasions, death. The most discussed spectator riots occur in Ohio in the USA after every State University football team's home game. Violence among spectators was also commonly experienced in Boston, in the mid-2000s, after every Major League Baseball Red Sox playoff championship.
Factors that Lead to Aggression
Some of the factors that can lead to aggressive players in sports are excess heat, point difference between teams, and competitive positions. As a result of excess heat, high temperatures increase the heart rate, resulting in discomfort, causing people to experience increased anger and frustration. Therefore, excess heat makes players more violent on the field. Most teams start a game with equal levels of aggression. However, as the game progresses and scores change to create point differences, the levels of aggression change. The winning team can become more aggressive to maintain their lead or become less aggressive in their play with the assurity that they have already won. The losing team can also become more aggressive to try and get more points to secure the lead or become less aggressive when they notice that their tactics, which involve high aggression, are not yielding results. Lastly, a well-performing team with a better position in a competition is more likely to display less aggressive behavior than a poor performing team at the bottom of a competition ( Sofia & Cruz, 2017 ). The difference in aggression results from varying levels of frustration. Bottom teams tend to engage in more violent actions because it will help them win and get better positions in the competition.
Most parents of children who take part in sports engage in violence occasionally. Situational factors like alcohol consumption and excess heat are the primary force behind parents' aggressive behavior. On most occasions, parents get overinvolved when the competition results lead to some financial gain in terms of professional contracts or scholarships.
For spectators, the psychological connection to a team, excessive alcohol consumption, and sometimes excess heat are the factors behind their aggressive behaviors. Spectators with a strong psychological connection to their teams are more likely to react violently when their squads do not perform as per their desires. When it comes to excessive alcohol use, spectators who attend games drunk are more likely to engage in aggressive behaviors than those who watch the game sober ( Fatma, Khan & Husain, 2017 ). When alcohol is combined with a high psychological connection to a team, a spectator's aggressive behavior can be fatal. The heat has the same effects on the spectators as it has on the players. It causes discomfort, raises the rate of breathing, and increases the probability of violent activities.
Impacts of Aggression in Sports
The most experienced impacts of aggression in sports are losing key players because of injury or getting sidelined for violent behaviors on the field. Aggression can also cause legal problems for the sports organizers and managers since they are tasked with reducing violent behavior among athletes. Furthermore, aggression can interfere with the team's functioning since some key players' elimination due to violent actions makes it impossible to function as expected, which leads to poor performance. Aggression also destroys interpersonal relationships, not only in the field but also in society. As described above, negative aggression in sports can sometimes lead to legal issues, including incarceration, arrests, and fines ( Sofia & Cruz, 2017 ). It also affects the victim's self-esteem, leading to social withdrawal and isolation, especially for children engaging in sporting events. On a positive note, when aggressive behaviors are applied within a game's rules, a team increases its chances of achieving the desired results since they make it possible for a team to overpower its opponents.
In conclusion, aggression in sports can either be positive or negative, depending on the behavior factors. It is also considered positive when the behavior does not violate the game's rules and is applied to achieve the desired outcomes. Parents of children who engage in sports, players and spectators are the identified parties that commonly engage in sports aggression. The heat, level of attachment to the team, alcohol influence, and the expected reward after the game are identified as major driving factors behind aggressive behaviors. Among some of the impacts of aggression in sports are the team's low functioning, disrupted socialization patterns, legal issues, and injuries. On a positive note, aggression makes a sport more competitive and enables achieving the desired results. Therefore, aggression in sports is an issue that should be appropriately scrutinized, and laws designed to manage the behavior to limit its negative impacts, not only in sports but also in society.
References
Fatma, H., Khan, T. F., & Husain, M. (2017). Psychobiology of aggression in sports. Indian Journal of Health & Wellbeing , 8 (7).
Sofia, R., & Cruz, J. F. A. (2017). Unveiling anger and aggression in sports: The effects of type of sport, competitive category and success level. Journal of Sports Psychology , 26 (2), 21-28.
