4 | 119 The transition to adulthood: A game changer!? parent affected the number, frequency, and/or setting of sport participation over the life course among our respondents. Sport frequency suffered from the occurrence of all these major life events. Respondents who experienced one of these events participated in sport less frequently than those who did not (between-person differences). Moreover, experiencing such an event reduced the sport frequency of individuals (within-person changes). Additionally, four events (all except beginning work) had a negative impact on the number of sports practised. This was reflected in both between-person differences and within-person changes in the number of sports practised after leaving fulltime education, entering an intimate relationship, and becoming a parent. For formalising a relationship through cohabitation or marriage we found only a between-person difference. Our additional analyses of interaction effects involving gender indicate that these conclusions are valid for the general population under investigation, as well as for men and women separately, with one exception: the between-effects of work turned out to be negative for men, but positive for women. In addition, being in a relationship had a stronger negative effect on sport frequency of men, and being a parent had a stronger negative effect on the number of sports practised by women. This suggests that the impact of particular life events on sport participation can be gendered, for example because traditional social norms are still prominent and an ethic of care prevails for women (Elling & Claringbould, 2005; Miller & Brown, 2005; Stuij, 2013), and future research could benefit from a gendercomparative approach. We furthermore and as expected found that when people entered an intimate relationship, they were more likely to switch from a “heavy” club setting to a “lighter” individual setting and to stop practising sport altogether, compared to those who stayed single. Based on our theoretical resource approach, we did not expect respondents who left full-time education and those who started working to be less likely to switch from a “heavy” club setting to a “lighter” setting, compared to those remaining in full-time education and not working. Although leaving full-time education and beginning work usually implies more time restrictions and social and professional obligations, which could hinder practising sport in a “heavy” setting, these findings are not very surprising viewed in light of earlier empirical work. Previous studies have shown that the highest dropout from club-organised sport is during late adolescence, when most people are still in full-time education (Borgers et al.,
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjY0ODMw