The Effect of Participation in Sports on Peer Relations and Social Support in Children Age 13-15 Years

The overall purpose of this research is to evaluate the effect of participation in sports on peer relations and social support in 13-15 age group children. The participants of this study consisted of 294 students between the age of 13-15. The data were collected with the Friendship Qualities Scale (FQS), Provision of Social Relationship Scale (PSRS) and Personal Information Form. Skewness, kurtosis, Box's M (p>0.05) and Levene's test (p>0.05) were performed for normality assumption before analysis. In the analysis of the data, Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) test was used for 2x2xn model together with descriptive statisticsThe t-test was used for independent groups for significance in the binary groups. The margin of error is taken as 0.05. As a result of the analyzes; it was found that the difference in gender and sports participation variables was statistically significant compared to the scores obtained from FQS and PSRS scales of children who participated in sports and not participated in sports but the interaction was not statistically significant when gender*sports participation variables were considered together. The children who participated in the sport had a significantly higher score in the "companionship" sub-dimension of the FQS and the "friend support" sub-dimension of PSRS than those who did not participate in the sport. In the "friend support" sub-dimension of the PSRS, those who participate in individual sports are significantly higher than those who participate in team sports. Therefore; It is suggested that children participating in adolescence period should be supported by adults and friends to improve their psychological health and social relations and that children participating in individual sports should be show awareness, emotional and social support should be given to them