Department of Orthopedics & Rehabilitation, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, Wisconsin.
Department of Epidemiology, Injury Prevention Research Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Clin J Sport Med. 2021 Mar 1;31(2):103-112. doi: 10.1097/JSM.0000000000000900.
Sport specialization is becoming increasingly common among youth and adolescent athletes in the United States and many have raised concern about this trend. Although research on sport specialization has grown significantly, numerous pressing questions remain pertaining to short- and long-term effects of specialization on the health and well-being of youth, including the increased risk of overuse injury and burnout. Many current elite athletes did not specialize at an early age. Methodological and study design limitations impact the quality of current literature, and researchers need to prioritize pressing research questions to promote safe and healthy youth sport participation. The American Medical Society for Sports Medicine hosted a Youth Early Sport Specialization Summit in April 2019 with the goal of synthesizing and reviewing current scientific knowledge and developing a research agenda to guide future research in the field based on the identified gaps in knowledge. This statement provides a broad summary of the existing literature, gaps and limitations in current evidence, and identifies key research priorities to help guide researchers conducting research on youth sport specialization. Our goals are to help improve the quality and relevance of research on youth sport specialization and to ultimately assure that opportunities for healthy and safe sport participation continue for all youth.
运动专业化在美国的青年和青少年运动员中越来越普遍，许多人对此趋势表示担忧。尽管有关运动专业化的研究有了显著增长，但仍有许多紧迫的问题涉及专业化对青少年健康和幸福的短期和长期影响，包括过度使用损伤和倦怠的风险增加。许多现役精英运动员并非从小就专攻某项运动。方法和研究设计的局限性影响了当前文献的质量，研究人员需要优先考虑紧迫的研究问题，以促进安全和健康的青少年体育参与。美国运动医学学会于 2019 年 4 月举办了青年早期运动专业化峰会，旨在综合和审查当前的科学知识，并根据知识空白制定研究议程，以指导该领域的未来研究。本声明广泛总结了现有文献、当前证据中的差距和局限性，并确定了关键的研究重点，以帮助指导从事青少年运动专业化研究的研究人员。我们的目标是帮助提高关于青少年运动专业化的研究质量和相关性，并最终确保所有青少年都有机会进行健康和安全的体育参与。
