Based on survey data derived from face-to-face interviews with 2,400 schoolchildren, 600 four-day diaries and focus groups with both elite performers, coaches and parents, the book offers a comprehensive overview of young people''s involvement in sport and physical activity in the 1990s. Deliberately set in the context of the literature on sport involvement and participation motivation, and alongside wider policy concerns, individual contributors each have accessed the data in order to address a particular substantive topic.Given the almost complete absence of hard data currently available in this field, the book should appeal not only to a local audience but to a wider international readership including sport scientists, sports'' administrators, coaches, teachers and policy makers, indeed anyone with an interest in the who, what, why and how of young people''s involvement in sport.

Based on survey data derived from face-to-face interviews with 2,400 schoolchildren, 600 four-day diaries and focus groups with both elite performers, coaches and parents, the book offers a comprehensive overview of young people''s involvement in sport and physical activity in the 1990s. Deliberately set in the context of the literature on sport involvement and participation motivation, and alongside wider policy concerns, individual contributors each have accessed the data in order to address a particular substantive topic.Given the almost complete absence of hard data currently available in this field, the book should appeal not only to a local audience but to a wider international readership including sport scientists, sports'' administrators, coaches, teachers and policy makers, indeed anyone with an interest in the who, what, why and how of young people''s involvement in sport.