IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/niesru/v232y2015i1pr51-r66.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Participation in School Sport and Post-School Pathways: Evidence from Ireland

Author

Listed:
  • Peter D. Lunn
  • Elish Kelly

Abstract

We examine the impact of participation in sport at secondary school on post-school pathways using a survey of Irish school-leavers, distinguishing between those who dropped out of sport during their secondary school years and those who continued playing in their final school years. We find that members of this latter group are, on completion of secondary schooling, significantly and substantially more likely to continue their education rather than to join the labour market. This effect survives controlling for individual background traits, school characteristics, attachment to the school and academic achievement. Our results are also robust to the use of propensity score matching to control for selection into participation in sport based on observable characteristics. We relate our findings to previous work on the potential labour market benefits of participation in sport and to the emerging literature on the role of consumption value in educational choice.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter D. Lunn & Elish Kelly, 2015. "Participation in School Sport and Post-School Pathways: Evidence from Ireland," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 232(1), pages 51-66, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:niesru:v:232:y:2015:i:1:p:r51-r66
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://ner.sagepub.com/content/232/1/R51.abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lipscomb, Stephen, 2007. "Secondary school extracurricular involvement and academic achievement: a fixed effects approach," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 463-472, August.
    2. Matthew Rabin & Ted O'Donoghue, 1999. "Doing It Now or Later," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(1), pages 103-124, March.
    3. Lunn, Pete, 2007. "Fair Play? Sport and Social Disadvantage in Ireland," Research Series, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), number BMI190.
    4. Markus M. Mobius & Tanya S. Rosenblat, 2006. "Why Beauty Matters," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 222-235, March.
    5. Sascha O. Becker & Marco Caliendo, 2007. "Sensitivity analysis for average treatment effects," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 7(1), pages 71-83, February.
    6. Pfeifer, Christian & Cornelißen, Thomas, 2010. "The impact of participation in sports on educational attainment--New evidence from Germany," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 94-103, February.
    7. Charlotte Cabane & Andrew E. Clark, 2015. "Childhood Sporting Activities andAdult Labour-Market Outcome," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 119-120, pages 123-148.
    8. Dan-Olof Rooth, 2009. "Obesity, Attractiveness, and Differential Treatment in Hiring: A Field Experiment," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(3).
    9. Morris, Stephen, 2006. "Body mass index and occupational attainment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 347-364, March.
    10. John M. Barron & Bradley T. Ewing & Glen R. Waddell, 2000. "The Effects Of High School Athletic Participation On Education And Labor Market Outcomes," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(3), pages 409-421, August.
    11. Marco Caliendo & Sabine Kopeinig, 2008. "Some Practical Guidance For The Implementation Of Propensity Score Matching," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 31-72, February.
    12. Annette Alstadsæter, 2011. "Measuring the Consumption Value of Higher Education," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 57(3), pages 458-479, September.
    13. Edward L. Glaeser & David Laibson & Bruce Sacerdote, 2002. "An Economic Approach to Social Capital," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(483), pages 437-458, November.
    14. Grossman, Michael, 1972. "On the Concept of Health Capital and the Demand for Health," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(2), pages 223-255, March-Apr.
    15. Rees, Daniel I. & Sabia, Joseph J., 2010. "Sports participation and academic performance: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(5), pages 751-759, October.
    16. Bradley T. Ewing, 2007. "The Labor Market Effects of High School Athletic Participation," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 8(3), pages 255-265, June.
    17. Cerin, Ester & Leslie, Eva, 2008. "How socio-economic status contributes to participation in leisure-time physical activity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(12), pages 2596-2609, June.
    18. Hamermesh, Daniel S & Biddle, Jeff E, 1994. "Beauty and the Labor Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1174-1194, December.
    19. John Cawley, 2004. "The Impact of Obesity on Wages," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 39(2).
    20. Long, James E & Caudill, Steven B, 1991. "The Impact of Participation in Intercollegiate Athletics on Income and Graduation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(3), pages 525-531, August.
    21. Theodore W. Schultz, 1960. "Capital Formation by Education," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 68(6), pages 571-571.
    22. Brian Jacob & Brian McCall & Kevin Stange, 2018. "College as Country Club: Do Colleges Cater to Students’ Preferences for Consumption?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(2), pages 309-348.
    23. Lisa Farrell & Michael A. Shields, 2002. "Investigating the economic and demographic determinants of sporting participation in England," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 165(2), pages 335-348, June.
    24. Lunn, Pete & Kelly, Elish & Fitzpatrick, Nick, 2013. "Keeping Them in the Game: Taking Up and Dropping Out of Sport and Exercise in Ireland," Research Series, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), number rs33.
    25. Gary S. Becker, 1964. "Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis with Special Reference to Education, First Edition," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number beck-5.
    26. Lechner, Michael, 2009. "Long-run labour market and health effects of individual sports activities," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 839-854, July.
    27. Lunn, Peter D., 2010. "The sports and exercise life-course: A survival analysis of recall data from Ireland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(5), pages 711-719, March.
    28. Rooth, Dan-Olof, 2011. "Work out or out of work -- The labor market return to physical fitness and leisure sports activities," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 399-409, June.
    29. Ewing, Bradley T., 1998. "Athletes and work," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 113-117, April.
    30. David Laibson, 1997. "Golden Eggs and Hyperbolic Discounting," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 443-478.
    31. Vasilios D. Kosteas, 2011. "High School Clubs Participation and Future Supervisory Status," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 49(Supplemen), pages 181-206, June.
    32. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-00875305 is not listed on IDEAS
    33. Michael Spence, 1973. "Job Market Signaling," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 87(3), pages 355-374.
    34. Yona Rubinstein & James J. Heckman, 2001. "The Importance of Noncognitive Skills: Lessons from the GED Testing Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 145-149, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Edgar Tovar-García, 2018. "The Association between Sport Activities and Educational Achievements: Evidence from Russian Longitudinal Data," Voprosy obrazovaniya / Educational Studies Moscow, National Research University Higher School of Economics, issue 2, pages 46-70.
    2. Knaus, Michael C. & Lechner, Michael & Reimers, Anne K., 2020. "For better or worse? – The effects of physical education on child development," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Charlotte Cabane & Andrew E. Clark, 2015. "Childhood Sporting Activities andAdult Labour-Market Outcome," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 119-120, pages 123-148.
    2. Cabane Charlotte & Lechner Michael, 2015. "Physical Activity of Adults: A Survey of Correlates, Determinants, and Effects," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 235(4-5), pages 376-402, August.
    3. Michael Lechner & Paul Downward, 2017. "Heterogeneous sports participation and labour market outcomes in England," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(4), pages 335-348, January.
    4. Rooth, Dan-Olof, 2011. "Work out or out of work -- The labor market return to physical fitness and leisure sports activities," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 399-409, June.
    5. Hyytinen, Ari & Lahtonen, Jukka, 2013. "The effect of physical activity on long-term income," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 129-137.
    6. Kavetsos, Georgios, 2011. "The impact of physical activity on employment," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 775-779.
    7. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-00875305 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Charlotte Cabane & Adrian Hille & Michael Lechner, 2015. "Mozart or Pelé? The Effects of Teenagers' Participation in Music and Sports," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 749, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    9. Cabane, Charlotte & Hille, Adrian & Lechner, Michael, 2016. "Mozart or Pelé? The effects of adolescents' participation in music and sports," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 90-103.
    10. Fricke, Hans & Lechner, Michael & Steinmayr, Andreas, 2018. "The effects of incentives to exercise on student performance in college," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 14-39.
    11. Lechner, Michael & Hille, Adrian & Cabane, Charlotte, 2015. "Mozart or Pelé? The effects of teenagers? participation in music and sports," CEPR Discussion Papers 10556, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Lechner, Michael & Fricke, Hans & Steinmayr, Andreas, 2017. "The Effect of Physical Activity on Student Performance in College: An Experimental Evaluation," CEPR Discussion Papers 12052, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. Lechner, Michael, 2009. "Long-run labour market and health effects of individual sports activities," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 839-854, July.
    14. Barone, Adriana & O'Higgins, Niall, 2010. "Fat and out in Salerno and its province: Adolescent obesity and early school leaving in Southern Italy," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 44-57, March.
    15. Arndt R. Reichert, 2015. "Obesity, Weight Loss, and Employment Prospects: Evidence from a Randomized Trial," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 50(3), pages 759-810.
    16. Lechner, Michael, 2008. "Long-Run Labour Market Effects of Individual Sports Activities," IZA Discussion Papers 3559, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Katie Schultz, 2017. "Do High School Athletes Get Better Grades During the Off-Season?," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 18(2), pages 182-208, February.
    18. Arndt Reichert, 2012. "Obesity, Weight Loss, and Employment Prospects – Evidence from a Randomized Trial," Ruhr Economic Papers 0381, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    19. repec:zbw:rwirep:0381 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Vasilios Kosteas, 2012. "The Effect of Exercise on Earnings: Evidence from the NLSY," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 33(2), pages 225-250, June.
    21. Ransom, Michael R & Ransom, Tyler, 2018. "Do high school sports build or reveal character? Bounding causal estimates of sports participation," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 75-89.
    22. Caliendo, Marco & Gehrsitz, Markus, 2016. "Obesity and the labor market: A fresh look at the weight penalty," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 209-225.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    sports participation; labour market; educational choice;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J40 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - General
    • L83 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Sports; Gambling; Restaurants; Recreation; Tourism

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:niesru:v:232:y:2015:i:1:p:r51-r66. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/niesruk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.