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Attitude towards Participation in Unified Sports: The Public View of Hong Kong
DU Mei, M. Soc. Sc. (PhD Candidate)
Department of Physical Education, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Introduction
Special Olympics Unified Sports was initiated in the United States in mid-1980s. Approximately equal numbers of athletes with and without intellectual disabilities (ID) are brought together for training and competition. Although its growth in the western world, especially in the United States, has been rapid, development in Hong Kong is still embryonic.
Over the years, some papers have been presented at various meetings and conferences. Their focus has been on key stakeholders of Unified Sports, namely Special Olympics athletes, partners, parents, coaches, state administrators (Siperstein & Hardman, 2001; Special Olympics Europe/Eurasia, 2005). Although the understanding of the participants' attitudes towards Unified Sports is important, there is also a need to know the pre-conditions necessary for implementing Unified Sports in a community. The purpose of this study was to assess the awareness and receptiveness of Hong Kong public towards Unified Sports and constraints they perceive about taking part in Unified Sports.
Method
Data was collected by telephone interviews with a random household sample generated by the Computer Aided Telephone Interview (CATI) system. The study population were Cantonese speaking Hong Kong residents aged 18 or above.
Apart from demographic information, the interview questions were explorative such as: do you know what Unified Sports is? Have you participated in Unified Sports? Why do you participate/not participate in Unified Sports? Will you encourage your family/friends to participate in it? What roles do you play/ want to play in Unified Sports? The development of the questionnaire was based on prior interviews with people who had participated in Unified Sports and who had not.
Results
General information on respondents
In total, 1006 respondents completed the interviews, 476 males and 530 females. The age of respondents was somewhat younger than one might expect from census statistics on the population (Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department, 2007): 18-24 (22.1%), 25-34 (14.3%), 35-44 (22.2%), 45-54 (18%), 55-64 (12.3%), and 65 and above (9.6%). In terms of other characteristics: 57.3% were married, 38.8% were single and the rest (4%) were divorced, separated, widowed or refused to provide the information; about 75.7% (n=762) had received education of secondary school or higher; and, in terms of employment, there was a mixture of occupation status among the respondents, including full-time job holders, students, and homemakers. Most respondents (93.6%) had no family member or friend with ID.
Knowledge and Experience with Unified Sports
The strongest finding was that a very large majority (98.6%) did not know of Unified Sports before the survey. Of the remaining 84 respondents, most had come across the term in media (mostly TV, radio and newspaper), with the next largest source from schools and friends, and the least from other sources such as work, Internet or family members. Only 10 had participated in Unified Sports.
Willingness to Participate
Before the interviewers introduced Unified Sports and its benefits, all respondents were asked if they were willing to participate in activities (not necessarily sports) with people with ID. Of the interviewees, 15.3% indicated willingness to do so, 55.3% did not care and 29.4% refused to interact with people with ID. However, after Unified Sports was introduced and respondents were asked if they would like to play Unified Sports in the coming year, 30.2% of respondents indicated willingness to do so. The rise in willingness to participate from some 15 to 30% lends itself to optimism that the volunteer base for Unified Sports can be substantially expanded. Their preferred sports included badminton, swimming, athletics, basketball, table tennis, and soccer. The major roles they would like to play including 'volunteer' (65.7%), and 'partner' (31.4%).
Interviewees who expressed interest in participation were also asked about constraints and facilitators (see Table 1). These were measured on a four point Likert-type scale with 0 indicating "not a facilitator at all" to 3 for "a very important facilitator." The higher the mean, the more important the facilitator was. The internal consistency coefficient for the scale was .71.
Table 1: Important Facilitators for Participation in Unified Sports (n = 303)
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Facilitator
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Mean
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Have more free time
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2.03
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Have more energy
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1.69
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Interest in the type of sport
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1.64
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Have more information about Unified Sports event
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1.56
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Know more about people with intellectual disabilities
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1.49
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Have a companion
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1.42
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Convenient transportation
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1.31
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Have related skills
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1.30
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Have financial ability
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1.29
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Being acquainted to person(s) with intellectual disabilities
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0.78
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