A Social Network Analysys of Influences On Athletes To Play With Pain and Injuries

Abstract

This paper shows how structural social network analysis can be a potentially powerful way of conceptualizing and explaining athletes' acceptance of the risks of pain and injury in sport. In particular, this paper shows how concepts and assumptions from structural social network analysis can clarify the conditions that make athletes vulnerable to cultural and interpersonal messages exhorting or encouraging them to play with pain and injuries. It is argued that the willingness of athletes to risk pain and injuries is affected by structural features of their sports networks (called "sportsnets"), by relations with individual sportsnet members, and by "the culture of risk" that is deeply embedded in serious athletic subcultures.