Youth-sport labels may shape athlete rights and risk

Rich James Kite and colleagues used a British Journal of Sports Medicine editorial published Oct. 12 to argue that sport needs clearer labels for athletes under 18 years and ages 18–21.

Evidence grade: Claim (no study cited). The article is an internally peer-reviewed editorial, not an outcome study; its practical concern is that different labels may alter how young athletes are interpreted across research, policy, practice and clinical care.

The authors wrote that participation in youth sport can support health, psychological, social and athletic development. They said research in the field spans performance, physiological response, psychosocial development and athletic identity.

Their central point is about terminology. The editorial said definitions of “youth” vary across domains, and that age-based labels are used inconsistently in research cohorts and organisational frameworks.

“The labels adopted to describe young people in sport are not neutral; they carry embedded assumptions about their capacities, rights, risks and responsibilities,” the authors wrote in the editorial.

The article uses “youth” as a broad category for athletes in sport systems for children, adolescents and early adults, rather than treating those groups as legally or developmentally identical. It also points to organisational differences in how children and young people are grouped.

One example cited by the authors is that participants under 18 years are often described as youth, while cohorts aged 18–21 years may be left outside youth-focused framing even when some organisational definitions include adolescents or young people in that range.

The issue matters because sport research and guidance are often applied beyond the setting in which they were produced. If a study, policy or clinical recommendation uses the same word for different age groups, readers may overextend its relevance to athletes with different legal status, developmental stage or support needs.

The editorial cannot show that inconsistent terminology is linked to harm, athlete outcomes or specific clinical errors. It does not provide a trial, cohort study, systematic review, sample size or effect estimate.

The argument applies to people designing, interpreting or applying youth-sport research and policy, not to a specific training intervention for young athletes. The authors declared no specific grant funding; Margo Mountjoy was listed as a BJSM deputy editor and member of a BJSM editorial board.

Source: editorial, British Journal of Sports Medicine, Oct. 12, 2026.

Atlas360 reports health research and does not provide medical advice.