Correspondence letter in response to Kincl et al manuscript.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Adolescent↗
Biomedical subjects
David C Schwebel
Publications and source records attributed to David C Schwebel.
Ecology of player-to-player contact in boys' youth soccer play.
INTRODUCTION: Youth soccer (football) injuries occur for a wide range of reasons, but the most frequent cause of injury is via player-to-player contact. This study was designed to study the ecology of collisions between players during youth soccer play. METHOD: Six teams of 11- and 12-year-old male players were followed over the course of a full season. Games were videotaped and reviewed to address three primary questions: how frequently do player-to-player collisions occur; when and where on the field do those collisions occur; and what is the rate of falls and injuries as a result of player-to-player contact. RESULTS: A total of 1,279 player-to-player collisions was observed, or an average of 65.59 collisions per game. Nearly half of the observed collisions resulted in one or both players falling to the ground, and about one-tenth resulted in the referee calling a foul, but very few of the collisions (less than 1%) resulted in an injury. Collisions occurred relatively consistently throughout the games, no matter what the score was. They occurred most frequently in the midfield area, when the ball was on or near the ground, and when players were attempting to retrieve a loose, uncontrolled ball. CONCLUSIONS: Results are discussed with respect to implications for injury prevention.
Child↗
Brief report: Increasing children's safe pedestrian behaviors through simple skills training.
OBJECTIVES: Hundreds of American children are killed and thousands more injured annually as pedestrians. Simple and effective interventions targeting behavioral changes in children are needed. METHODS: The present study tested a simple, skill-based training method for increasing safe pedestrian behaviors. Eighty-five children ages 5-8 participated. RESULTS: Children behaved more safely following training, indicating very brief training can produce at least short-term improvements in pedestrian behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: Results are discussed with regard to the involvement of parents in the practical application of a simple training procedure and future directions for pedestrian interventions.
Accidents, Traffic↗
Brief report: Behavioral risk factors for youth soccer (football) injury.
OBJECTIVES: By most reports, soccer (football) is among the most played and most popular sports in the world. This study prospectively examined behavioral risk factors for youth soccer injury. METHOD: Sixty 11- and 12-year-old boys who played on six teams in a suburban recreational soccer league were followed over the course of a season. Six predictors were assessed prior to the start of the season via self-report measures from coaches, parents, and the players themselves: inhibition, aggression, risk-taking, skill, experience playing soccer, and physical size. All games were videotaped, and tapes were reviewed to record players' collisions with other players, fouls, falls during the course of play, and injuries. RESULTS: Greater skill and less experience playing soccer best predicted injury risk. Inhibition, aggression, and risk-taking did not emerge as predictors. CONCLUSION: Results are discussed with respect to previous research in youth sport and general pediatric injury risk.
Adult↗
The influences of demographics and individual differences on children's selection of risky pedestrian routes.
OBJECTIVE: Thousands of American children under the age of 10 are injured annually as pedestrians. Despite the scope of this public health problem, knowledge about behavioral factors involved in the etiology of child pedestrian injury remains sparse. The present study considered the roles of age, gender, ethnicity, family income, and inhibitory control on children's selection of safe pedestrian routes. METHODS: Children's selections of risky pedestrian routes were examined in two laboratory analogue tasks. Multiple behavioral and self-report methods were used to measure temperamental inhibitory control. RESULTS: Children from lower-income families, children of ethnic minority background, younger children, and those with less temperamental control selected riskier pedestrian routes. CONCLUSIONS: Prevention efforts might be tailored to focus on children at higher risk for pedestrian injury, such as younger, under-controlled children.
Accidents, Traffic↗
How mothers parent their children with behavior disorders: implications for unintentional injury risk.
INTRODUCTION: This study was designed to test the role of parental supervision in explaining why children with behavior disorders have increased risk of unintentional injury. METHOD: Children referred to a pediatric behavior disorders clinic and their mothers were unknowingly observed in a "hazard room" environment that housed several items that appeared dangerous but actually were altered to be safe. RESULTS: Mother and child behavior in the hazard room was correlated to parent-, teacher-, and observational-reports of children's externalizing behavior patterns, children's injury history, and mother's parenting styles. Maternal ignoring of children's dangerous behavior in the hazard room was the strongest correlate to children's injury history. CONCLUSIONS: Poor parental supervision might serve as a mechanism to explain why children with behavior disorders, and those with oppositional behavior patterns in particular, have increased risk of unintentional injury.
Accident Prevention↗
Individual difference factors in risky driving: the roles of anger/hostility, conscientiousness, and sensation-seeking.
Motor vehicle crashes claim the lives of more Americans than any other cause of injury. One factor long recognized as relevant to predicting dangerous driver behavior is the driver's personality. This study examines the independent and combined roles of three personality traits--sensation-seeking, conscientiousness, and anger/hostility--in predicting risky driving behavior. Seventy-three participants completed personality and driving history questionnaires, and also engaged in a virtual environment (VE) task designed to assess risk-taking driving behavior. Each facet of personality was correlated to risky driving behavior in independent univariate analyses. In multivariate analyses, sensation-seeking emerged as the best predictor of self-reported driving violations. Anger/hostility and the interactive effect of anger/hostility by sensation-seeking also emerged in a multivariate analysis predicting one measure of self-reported driving violations. No personality trait predicted risky driving in the VE in multivariate analyses. Results are discussed with respect to previous work in the field, challenges involved in measuring the constructs of interest, and implications to prevention.
Accidents, Traffic↗
The Stamp-in-Safety program: a behavioral intervention to reduce behaviors that can lead to unintentional playground injury in a preschool setting.
OBJECTIVE: To introduce and evaluate the Stamp-in-Safety program, a behavioral intervention designed to increase the quality of supervision by teachers on preschool playgrounds and to reduce the risk of unintentional child playground injury. METHODS: A quasi-experimental time series design was used, with observational techniques, to evaluate behavior on the playground before, during, and after the intervention as well as during a 6-month post-intervention assessment. RESULTS: Both applied behavior analysis techniques and inferential statistics suggest that the Stamp-in-Safety program resulted in behavioral changes likely to reduce the risk of child injury on the playgrounds of childcare centers. CONCLUSION: Results indicate promise for the Stamp-in-Safety program as a low-cost, easily implemented intervention to reduce pediatric playground injury risk at childcare centers. Suggestions for future research are offered.
Adult↗
Does time spent in child care influence risk for unintentional injury?
OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of quantity and quality of early child care on children's risk for unintentional injury. METHODS: A diverse cohort of 1,225 children was recruited from several sites in the United States and followed from birth until first grade. Quantity and quality of child care from birth until entry into kindergarten were used to predict unintentional injuries from age 6 months until first grade. Measures from an evaluation at 6 months of age were tested as covariates. RESULTS: Children who spent more time in nonparental childcare environments were at slightly reduced risk for unintentional injury after controlling for child (gender, temperament), family [socioeconomic status (SES)], parent (positive parenting), and child care (quality of care) characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: We discuss possible explanations for the results, including the possibilities that childcare center environments are safer than the homes of most preschoolers or that attendance in child care is nonrandom.
Child Care↗
Contributions of multiple risk factors to child injury.
OBJECTIVE: Most previous research on etiological factors that predict children's unintentional injuries has focused on single independent risk factors that predict injury, but psychological methods and theory lend themselves to simultaneous consideration of multiple risk factors that might together create an increased or decreased risk for injury. METHOD: One approach to considering multiple risk factors of child injury, inspired by Lizette Peterson's notion of process analysis, is to consider how risk factors serve in moderated, mediated, and mediated moderation roles to each other. We present two lines of research that exemplify such models. In each, multiple risk factors for child injury are considered within a single theoretical model. CONCLUSIONS: Implications for understanding the etiology of children's unintentional injuries and developing empirically derived injury prevention techniques are discussed.
Child↗
Injury risk among children of low-income U.S.-born and immigrant mothers.
The number of immigrants in the United States is at an all time high, yet psychologists have largely ignored the domain of immigrant health. This article considers 1 aspect of immigrant health, risk for pediatric injury. A sample of over 5,000 5-year-old children from impoverished families was studied; approximately 13% had immigrant mothers. Children of immigrants had a significantly lower rate of injury in the prior year. This was particularly true of non-White children of immigrants. Three possible mediators for this finding--assistance with parenting, parenting style, and health care accessibility--were considered, but none explained the difference. The need for further research on the topic and implications of results for injury prevention are discussed.
Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity↗
The role of impulsivity in children's estimation of physical ability: implications for children's unintentional injury risk.
Unintentional injuries are the leading cause of pediatric mortality. One factor that appears to predict injury risk is children's overestimation of physical ability. Fifty-seven 6-year-olds judged their ability to complete basic physical tasks. Half the sample was required to wait 7 s before judging their ability; the other half was permitted to judge immediately. There were no differences in ability estimation accuracy between the 2 groups, suggesting that the institution of a forced decision latency does not increase children's ability estimation accuracy. Replicating previous work, children tended to overestimate their ability, and overestimation of ability was related to history of unintentional injury. Possible explanations for the null finding are offered, and implications to injury prevention and future research are discussed.
Child↗
Interactions between child behavior patterns and parenting: implications for children's unintentional injury risk.
OBJECTIVES: Two factors were considered as predictors of children's risk for unintentional injury: (a) children's temperamentally difficult behavior patterns and (b) parenting. Along with hypotheses to replicate previous univariate effects, it was hypothesized that active, involved parents with sufficient time resources might reduce injury risk among temperamentally at-risk children. METHODS: Study 1 used a retrospective design with a diverse sample of over 10,000 5-year-olds. Study 2 replicated Study 1 using a prospective design and behavioral data from a sample of over 1,000 children followed from 6 to 36 months of age. RESULTS: In Study 1, male gender, child hyperactivity, and family poverty predicted injury in a univariate manner. In Study 2, male gender and lack of positive parenting predicted injury in a univariate manner. Interaction effects also emerged: in Study 1 the interaction between child hyperactivity and parental time resources protected children from injury, and in Study 2 the interaction between child's difficult temperament and positive parenting protected children from injury. CONCLUSIONS: Children at increased risk for injury, i.e., those with hyperactive and difficult behavior patterns, might be protected in the environment of positive parenting. Theoretically, results suggest that researchers should consider Temperament x Environment interactions along with univariate predictors of outcome behavior. From an applied perspective, results have implications for the design of injury prevention campaigns: Parents who spend positive time with temperamentally difficult children might protect them from injury.
Analysis of Variance↗
Is there a link between children's motor abilities and unintentional injuries?
PROBLEM: The common view is that clumsy children experience unintentional injury more frequently. Empirical evidence supporting this position is mixed. METHOD: One hundred 6- and 8-year-olds completed a battery of nine tasks designed to assess motor ability. Mothers completed a lifetime injury history measure about their children and families completed a 2-week injury diary assessing frequency and severity of daily injuries. RESULTS: Internal reliability for the motor ability battery was good. Correlations between motor ability measures and injury risk were nonsignificant and near zero. DISCUSSION: Motor ability does not appear to be directly related to injury risk. Possible explanations include: (a) coordinated and clumsy children engage in hazardous activities with differing frequency; or (b) other individual difference factors may interact with motor ability to explain children's injury risk. IMPACT ON INDUSTRY: Children's motor abilities do not appear to be directly linked to rate of unintentional injury, but instead may influence risk for injury in conjunction with other factors. Results could have implications to the engineering of children's toys and playground equipment and to the design of appropriate supervision strategies for children engaging in potentially dangerous activities.
Accidents↗
Using an injury diary to describe the ecology of children's daily injuries.
PROBLEM: Two problems were addressed in this study. First, are daily injury diaries an effective means to gather information about children's unintentional injuries? Second, what are the circumstances of children's injuries as recorded through the diary method? METHOD: Two studies were conducted with a total of 172 children to describe the ecology of children's daily unintentional injuries. Families completed a daily diary for 14 days, describing the circumstances surrounding the injuries children experienced each day. RESULTS: Descriptive data is provided on the locations, causes, and types of injuries children incurred, as well as who was present when they were injured. Daily injury rate was modestly related to the number of major injuries children had incurred in their lifetimes. DISCUSSION: The diary methodology was an effective means to study the ecology of children's daily injuries. Children's injuries occur in a wide range of circumstances that can be quantified through diary techniques. IMPACT ON INDUSTRY: Data obtained from daily injury diaries may be useful in a variety of areas, including study of the etiology of childhood injury, design of interventions to prevent injury, and engineering of toys and playground equipment for children.
Accident Prevention↗
Unintentional injury in preschool boys with and without early onset of disruptive behavior.
OBJECTIVE: To determine subsequent risk of unintentional injury among preschool boys diagnosed with ODD, boys with comorbid ODD and ADHD, and boys matched demographically to the clinical sample; to test predictive validity of a measure of injury proneness; and to examine factors that might predict injury beyond clinic status. METHODS: Seventy-nine consecutive clinic-referred preschool-age boys and 76 demographically matched boys without disruptive behavior participated in a 2-year prospective longitudinal design. Time 1 assessment included clinical diagnosis, parent-reported injury proneness, attachment, and verbal abilities. Injury history was measured 1 and 2 years later. RESULTS: Clinic-referred children had more injuries than the comparison group. Children with comorbid ODD and ADHD had approximately the same injury rate as those with ODD but not ADHD. Parent-reported injury proneness was unrelated to subsequent injuries. Neither attachment nor verbal ability predicted injury significantly beyond clinic status. CONCLUSIONS: Children with early disruptive behavior are at increased risk of unintentional injury and therefore should be considered prime candidates for injury prevention campaigns.
Age Factors↗
The role of parents and temperament on children's estimation of physical ability: links to unintentional injury prevention.
OBJECTIVE: Unintentional injuries, the leading cause of pediatric mortality, are caused by a complex set of intrapersonal and environmental factors. The role of three critical variables--parental supervision, children's temperament, and estimation of children's physical abilities--was examined. METHODS: Sixty-four 6- and 8-year-old children completed a laboratory experiment with a parent. Both children and parents judged the child's ability to complete reaching, stepping, and crouching tasks. Parents also completed a parent-report measure of children's temperament. RESULTS: Both children and parents overestimated children's ability, although children did so more than parents. Parents of temperamentally impulsive and undercontrolled children judged that their children could complete tasks that were actually beyond the child's ability. Temperament also affected children's judgments while parents were known to be present or absent: Temperamentally impulsive and undercontrolled children were more accurate in their judgments when parents were standing next to them than when parents were hidden from view behind a one-way mirror. CONCLUSIONS: The mechanism by which parental supervision might protect children from injury appears to be at least twofold: (a) Parents overestimate children's ability less frequently than children themselves, suggesting supervising parents could intervene to prevent children from attempting dangerous activities; and (b) children judge their physical abilities more cautiously when parents are present. Implications for temperament theory and for injury prevention are discussed.
Child↗
The role of fathers in toddlers' unintentional injury risk.
OBJECTIVES: Previous work suggests that maternal parenting and supervision reduces risk for children's unintentional injuries, but very little research has examined the role of fathers in children's unintentional injury risk. The role of fathers in protecting children from unintentional injury was considered. METHODS: A prospective longitudinal design predicted injury risk in 181 toddlers from the ages of 6 to 36 months. Predictor variables included child gender and temperament, individual difference factors of the mother and father, and parenting factors of the mother and father. RESULTS: Hierarchical regression models suggested that fathers' report of gains to the family from their employment was the strongest predictor of risk of children's unintentional injury. Several other paternal and maternal factors were also modestly related to injury risk. CONCLUSIONS: Data indicate the need to consider the role of fathers in protecting children from unintentional injuries.
Child↗