Demographic Differences in Protective Sports Equipment Usage Among Children

Purpose: While physical activity is essential for healthy child development, sports safety practices are crucial to prevent unnecessary injuries. Out of the 30 million children in the U.S. who participate in organized sports each year, several million are treated for sports-related injuries, many of which may result from limited usage of protective sports equipment (PE). To date, no studies have examined differences in the perceived importance of PE usage among parents in various demographic groups. The goal of this study was to investigate differences in parental attitudes towards PE usage based on child race, gender, ethnicity, and number of siblings. Methods: Parents of children (4-18 years) responded to an anonymous questionnaire via Amazon Mechanical Turk reporting demographic characteristics of their children and the age, if any, at which they would allow their child to participate in 9 sports without PE (volleyball, basketball, baseball, ice hockey, football, soccer, lacrosse, biking, skateboarding) in recreational, training, and competitive environments. A two-sample t-test was performed to compare these ages by gender, race (White/Black), and ethnicity. A Pearson Correlation was used to assess whether this age varied with the number of children in the family. Results: Children of responding parents were 60% male; 75.3% White, 10.4% Black, 5.5% Asian, 8.7% Other; 87.8% not Hispanic/Latino. For all sport/environment combinations, parents reported a lower age at which they would permit participation without PE for male children, with significant differences of 2 years, on average, in 8 sport/environment combinations. Parents of White children reported a lower age than parents of Black children, with significant differences of 2.4 years, on average, in 10 sport/environment combinations. Similarly, parents of non-Hispanic children indicated they were willing to allow sports participation without PE for younger children (Table 1). For four sport/environment combinations, the age at which parents would be comfortable with their children playing without PE decreased as the number of children in the family increased (Table 2). Conclusion: Major disparities were found with regard to parental perceived importance of PE across all demographic categories, including race, gender, and ethnicity. Of particular vulnerability are male children, Non- Hispanic and White children, and those with more siblings. It is imperative that pediatricians educate all parents on