Do sport-specific stressors predict athletic injury?

Previous research concerning the relation between life stress and athletic injury has not assessed the separate predictive contribution of sport-related stress and stressors in other life domains. We propose that stressful life events that occur within the same environmental context as the outcome may have an impact that goes beyond general life stress. The present study eliminates the potential confounding of the two classes of life events, as well as potential masking effects of social desirability. In a prospective study involxing 425 high school athletes (236 males and 189 females) in four sports, preseason measures of both sport-specific and non-sport stressful life events were administered. Injury time loss was tracked during the subsequent season. The results indicated that sport-specific stressful events accounted for statistically significant injury time loss variance beyond that accounted for by general negative life stress only for female athletes. Implications of the findings for interpreting previous research and for designing future studies are discussed.