U.S. college football players don’t accurately estimate their risk of concussion or injury, according to a recently released report.
In the report, “Accuracy of U.S. College Football Players’ Estimates of Their Risk of Concussion or Injury,” authors Drs. Christine M. Baugh, Emily Kroshus, William P. Meehan III, Thomas G. McGuire and Laura A. Hatfield explore how college football players gauge their risk of serious injury. At a time of heightened concern regarding the short-term and long-term consequences of participating in contact sports, the authors wanted to assess how athletes understand their own risk for sports-related injuries.
The researchers contacted 65 Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams from the Power 5 conferences: Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten Conference, Big 12 Conference, Pacific-12 Conference and Southeastern Conference. Four teams agreed to allow their student-athletes to participate. The study was conducted from February to May 2017. The 296 participants were provided with information about the study and an informed consent form, and they could ask questions.
The student-athletes completed a 15-minute questionnaire in which they estimated their likelihood of sustaining a concussion and/or other injury during football season using an ordinal scale that ranged from 1 for “definitely won’t” to 7 for “definitely will.” Each participant provided information about previous injuries as well as their primary playing position and years of participation in full-contact football. About 51% of the participants identified as non-Hispanic White. Baugh said the researchers did not see differences by race or ethnicity in terms of responses.
One of the researchers’ analytic strategies suggested that 43% of athletes underestimated their risk of injury and 42% underestimated their risk of concussion. Alternative analytic strategies suggested that 91% of athletes underestimated their risk of injury and 63% underestimated their risk of concussion.
“Our study doesn’t answer the question of why football athletes tend to underestimate their risks of injury or concussion,” said Baugh, an assistant professor of medicine at the Center for Bioethics and Humanities, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. “However, there are several general trends that may be influential. On average, people see their risk as less than others, men tend to view activities as less risky than women, people who participate in activity view it as less risky than an outside observer, and athletes perceive lower risks than non-athletes.”
The report notes that many college players underestimate the risk of football-related injury in general and concussions specifically, even though 34% reported sustaining at least one suspected concussion in the previous football season.
