Exploring Features of the Parasport Environment Associated With Quality Participation

Area of Science:

• Sports Science
• Rehabilitation Medicine
• Disability Studies

Background:

• The quality parasport participation framework suggests environmental factors influence participation quality and psychosocial outcomes.
• Understanding how specific environmental features impact parasport participation is crucial for program development.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine if features of the physical, program, and social environments predict quality parasport participation.
• To investigate the relationships between specific foundational strategies and quality participation in adults with physical impairments.

Main Methods:

• Adults (n=270) with physical impairments in parasport completed surveys on quality participation and 16 environmental features.
• Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to assess the predictive power of environmental features within each domain (physical, program, social).

Main Results:

• The physical environment explained 18.4% of the variance in quality participation.
• The program environment explained 22.3% of the variance in quality participation.
• The social environment explained a significant 33.3% of the variance in quality participation, indicating a large effect size.

Conclusions:

• The findings support the quality parasport participation framework.
• Environmental strategies, particularly social ones, are key to fostering quality parasport participation and positive psychosocial outcomes.
• Program leaders can utilize these strategies to improve parasport experiences.