Anette Skilbred is a research fellow at the Institute of Sports and Social Sciences. She will defend her thesis Young athletes and performance enhancement: A social-constructivist perspective on June 21, at NIH, auditorium Innsikt, 10:15 CET, and on YouTube (see below).
Anette’s project sheds light on the interaction between young athletes and their networks, with a particular focus on how athletes shape their meaning of performance-enhancing substances within these networks. There is a specific emphasis on nutritional supplements and anti-doping work. By applying an interactionist perspective, she has explored and illuminated processes of meaning-making.
In the field she studies, there is an abundance of research showing changes in attitudes and outcomes of various risk factors, providing valuable insights into different relationships. At the same time, there are fewer studies on how meaning is created and evolves in interaction, so she considers the greatest strength of the project to be gaining insight into some of the processes when athletes attribute meaning to nutritional supplements, etc. This has provided insights into nuances and paradoxes that would not have emerged, for example, with a questionnaire.
The results highlight the importance of social interactions and networks in athletes’ formation of their own opinions on performance-enhancing substances. Through interviews, Anette has grasped the nuances present in these opinions, including that nutritional supplements can be understood as performance-enhancing while also being considered part of daily nutrition. Furthermore, the project seeks to demonstrate how being an ambitious young athlete with a desire to perform infiltrates multiple areas of life beyond the classic realms of training, rest, and nutrition.
This insight into the experiences of young athletes holds valuable implications for coaches, decision-makers, and sports organisations striving to support and ensure the holistic development of ambitious athletes.
Supervisors
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- Sigmund Loland, Professor, Institute of Sports and Social Sciences, Norwegian School of Sport Sciences.
- Åse Strandbu, Professor, Institute of Sports and Social Sciences, Norwegian School of Sport Sciences.
Committee
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- Chair: Christian Thue Bjørndal, Associate Professor, Institute of Sports and Social Sciences, Norwegian School of Sport Sciences.
- First opponent: Fabien Ohl, Professor, University of Lausanne
- Second opponent: Anne Tjønndal, Professor, Nord University
