GENDER DIFFERENCES IN PREFERENCES OF INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM SPORTS IN POLISH ADOLESCENTS

Character and preferences of various types of physical activity (PA) of adolescents vary greatly in diff erent educational systems and socio-cultural conditions. In diff erent socio-cultural conditions are the highest diff erences still found between girls and boys (Aaron, Storti, Robertson, Kriska, & Laporte, 2002). That is related to the sound diff erences in socialization and upbringing of both genders (McHale, Crouter, & Whiteman, 2003). Children embrace behavioral traits that are perceived by society as “typical” for particular gender and when they enter the fi rst grade in the elementary school they already express behavioral patterns appropriate for the masculine or feminine stereotype. It is also the result of more or less successful socialization in the particular culture (Alexander, 2003; Pryor, 1994). Since girls are less physically active than boys (Aze vedo, Araujo, Da Silva, & Hallal, 2007; Kjønniksen, Torsheim, & Wold, 2008; Sigmundová, El Ansari, Sigmund, & Frömel, 2011), it is more than important to understand the specifi cs of PA in girls (but also boys) and their preferences. Understanding these specifi cs can increase the effectiveness of potential interventions in physical programs (school, public) that were created in attempt to support PA in children and adolescents (Pate et al., 2010). Current Polish educational system (similarly to systems of other post communist countries), in spite of attempts for change, is suited better for feminine types of behavior where teachers demand especially discipline, GENDER DIFFERENCES IN PREFERENCES OF INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM SPORTS IN POLISH ADOLESCENTS


INTRODUCTION
Character and preferences of various types of physical activity (PA) of adolescents vary greatly in diff erent educational systems and socio-cultural conditions.In diff erent socio-cultural conditions are the highest diff erences still found between girls and boys (Aaron, Storti, Robertson, Kriska, & Laporte, 2002).That is related to the sound diff erences in socialization and upbringing of both genders (McHale, Crouter, & Whiteman, 2003).Children embrace behavioral traits that are perceived by society as "typical" for particular gender and when they enter the fi rst grade in the elementary school they already express behavioral patterns appropriate for the masculine or feminine stereotype.It is also the result of more or less successful socialization in the particular culture (Alexander, 2003;Pryor, 1994).
Since girls are less physically active than boys (Aze vedo, Araujo, Da Silva, & Hallal, 2007;Kjønniksen, Torsheim, & Wold, 2008;Sigmundová, El Ansari, Sigmund, & Frömel, 2011), it is more than important to understand the specifi cs of PA in girls (but also boys) and their preferences.Understanding these specifi cs can increase the effectiveness of potential interventions in physical programs (school, public) that were created in attempt to support PA in children and adolescents (Pate et al., 2010).Current Polish educational system (similarly to systems of other post communist countries), in spite of attempts for change, is suited better for feminine types of behavior where teachers demand especially discipline, subordination, behavioral control, focus, willingness to submit to leadership, etc.Consequently, many teachers still prefer rigid, conforming, respectful, thoughtful, passive, calm, and neat students rather than students who are nonconformist, fl exible, active, independent, and so on.Preferable characteristics have predominantly fe minine traits.
Decreasing diff erences between feminine and masculine sports is to a certain degree a result of the social philosophy of activists/reformers who try to declassify traditional sports to the masses of women and also a re sult of feminists' critique of positivistic traditions in sport psychology (Cratty, 1983;Singer, Murphey, & Tennant, 1993).Formerly women were neglected in sports and the majority of studies were conducted only with the male population.Currently it seems appro priate to conduct comparative studies or only studies with the female population.There was also a trend to look at masculine and feminine sports as two distinct units that were absolutely unrelated.However, the reason for that was spurious (physiological rightfulness, series of similarities, etc.).Therefore, it suggests itself that these two units should be unifi ed and only certain specifi cs that are particular for males or females should be set aside (Singer, Murphey, & Tennant, 1993;Wilson & Spink, 2009).
Everyday activities of children and adolescents represent important developmental opportunities that serve as a tool for socialization and cultural knowledge and skill acquisition.The youth population selects various activities to actively engage in, activities that can and often do create their lifestyle and habits associated with it (Kjønniksen, Torsheim, & Wold, 2008).Identifi cation of the activities preferred by boys and girls is important especially because various activities can enhance diff erent cognitive, social, and motor skills and moreover, because these gender-related interests/preferences change with age.Boys incline more to intense activities, activities that are more physically demanding and team sports while girls incline to participate in sedentary activities, individual sports, and uncompetitive sport ac tivities (Bradley, McMurray, Harrell, & Deng, 2000;Faucette et al., 1995).Cherney and London (2006) in their study emphasized the fact that gender related preferen ces are present across all domains of human life (including PA) and those diff erences are more evident in younger individuals.
In the interest of strengthening the role of physical education (PE) at schools PE teachers should respect students' preferences and needs when choosing activities for particular educational units (Greenwood & Stillwell, 2001;Pate, Dowda, OʼNeill, & Ward, 2007).PE can more likely survive and increase its prestige if the activities preferred by both boys and girls are included in the educational PE units.There are many factors that can infl uence students' selection or preferences of sport activities.These include sport and environmental infl u-ence, gender, age, skill level and individual's level of PA outside the school (Eyler, Nanney, Brownson, Lochman, & Haire-Joshu, 2006;Frömel, Formánková, & Sallis, 2002;Hill & Cleven, 2005).Bradley, McMurry, Harrell, and Deng (2000) indicate that girls at high schools prefer uncompetitive or individual sport activities, while boys at the same age incline to team sports.Hill and Cleven (2005) further indicate that adolescent girls participate more often in individual or noncontact sport activities such as swimming, volleyball, aerobics, gymnastics, and jumping rope, while boys more often choose contact or power sports such as working out, hockey, or soccer.Research done with high school students shows that boys prefer to participate in physical activities that give them the opportunity to experience competition, while girls focus more on social parameters of physical activities (Greenwood & Stillwell, 2001).
The purpose of the present study is to examine the re lationships among boys' and girls' preferences in individual and team sports and further among these pre ferences and boys' and girls' participation in an organized PA.Particularly: 1) Describe and compare the sport preferences in individual and team sports of boys and girls in diff erent age groups; 2) Describe the girlsʼ and boysʼ participation in organized physical activity from the aspect of individual and team sports preferences.

Data description
Online research was conducted in the Katowice region and 1,131 students participated in the study (TABLE 1).All high schools in the region were invited to participate but only individuals from the schools that agreed with the research participated.All participants gave researchers their consent to participate in the study and to complete a sport preferences questionnaire.

Sport preferences questionnaire
A sport preferences questionnaire that participants completed via the online system INDARES (http://www.indares.com) was used to determine the preferenc es in individual and team sports (Křen, Chmelík, Frömel, Fical, & Kudláček, 2008).The questionnaire included seven groups of sport activities -individual sports, team sports, conditional activities, water sport activities, outdoor sport activities, martial arts, rhythmic and dancing activities.Only results from the groups of individual and team sports were used in the study.Furthermore, overall preferences related to particular groups of sports activities were used.
In regard to standardization of the questionnaire, stability was tested using the test-retest and Spearman correlation coeffi cient (rs).The highest stability between the fi rst and the second measurements were in the group of team sports (0.81, 0.76 respectively).The biggest stability was then recorded for the group of rhythmic and dancing activities and martial arts (0.62, 0.68 respectively for rhythmic and dancing activities; 0.68, 0.61 respectively for martial arts) (Sigmund, Mitáš, Kudláček, & Frömel, 2007).

Procedures
Data were collected in computer labs in selected schools.Participants completed the questionnaire in the online system while supervised always by the same members of the research team in order to secure the iden tical introductory information for research completion.Participants' questioned only the diff erentiation of organized and unorganized PA in relation to teachers', coaches', instructors' etc. leadership.
The completion of the sport preferences questionnaire includes several steps.First, it is examined, whether participants engage in organized PA or not.Then, researchers investigate in which activities students participate the most during summer and winter.The subsequent forms already contain particular groups of PA and participants are asked to select up to 5 activities from the off ered lists.They are asked to arrange the acti vities in descending order starting with their most favorite activity.There is no required number of activities they have to enter so in extreme cases it can happen that there will be no activities recorded for a particular group.The system will notify the user, but will not require a response.This way participants record individual sports, team sports, conditional activities, water sport activities, outdoor sport activities, martial arts, rhythmic and dancing activities.The last form is dedicated to the groups in general and to the selection of the overall most favorite activity.
Data analysis is conducted in several steps.First, re searchers' set point values for particular PA.If PA was entered by a participant, its point value equals to the position of that PA in the participant's ranking.If the participant did not record any activity within a par-ticular group, its value has to be counted according to the following formula -(PAS + PZAS + 1)/2 where PAS stands for the overall number of activities in a particular group and PZAS stands for the number of activities that were recorded by a participant in the group.The next step is matching the point value with the sports group using the same principle as for the individual activities.Therefore, the most favorite PA, respectively sports groups, has the lowest values in the overall summary.
An evaluation of the most favorite activity follows.That makes sense especially for a larger group of participants.Votes for particular activities are added up and at the end researchers create a ranking of activities that were mentioned most frequently.
The last step is an evaluation of PA characteristics.A list of 39 characteristics that may specify participants' personal traits according to the selected PA was created.A team of specialists further processed a table where point values of all characteristics were specifi ed for each activity.The range of the values is 1 to 5, decimal numbers can be used.Value 1 means a high integration of the particular characteristic in PA while value 5 means the lowest integration of the particular characteristic.
Only activities that were placed on the fi rst position in the ranking for a particular group were added to the computation of the overall values in certain charac teristics.In case there was no PA in some groups, avera ges of the characteristics from the recorded groups were computed and added to the overall point values.To refi ne the computation and to enable a comparison of individual characteristics among each other, researchers also included an overall characteristic point power.Point value for the characteristics is thus adjusted with the following formula -(SZB/CBC) × 100.
SZB is an overall value of obtained points for given characteristic and CBC is an overall computation of point characteristics for all PA.Therefore, the fi nal table enables us to observe which characteristics within physical activities are preferred by an individual, eventually the whole group.Characteristics with the lowest number of points are the most preferred ones, while those with the highest values are represented in a selected PA less.Eight boys and 7 girls had to be excluded from the study during data analysis because they did not correctly indicate their somato-metric parameters or age.

Data analysis
For statistical analysis in StatisticaCZ 9 and SPSS 19.0 we used basic statistical procedures, Mann-Whitney U test, correlation analysis (rs) and d "eff ect size" coeffi cient (Cohen, 1988;Cortina & Nouri, 2000).We interpret coeffi cient d as a small eff ect size when 0 < d < 0.2; medium eff ect size when 0.2 ≤ d < 0.8; and a large eff ect size when d ≥ 0.8 (Cohen, 1988).One hour of a documented PA is considered to be empirically important in a weekly organized PA (Pate et al., 2010).Legend: M -average point value for rankings, computed for one participant Recorded sports also include a variety of executions and kinetically very similar activities.

RESULTS
The most preferred individual sport in girls is swimming and that applies to all age groups (TABLE 2).The second position for girls belongs to skating (inc.inline) and the third to sport gymnastics in 15 year old girls and to cycling for both older groups of girls (16 and 17 year old girls).As well as girls, boys of all age groups prefer swimming in individual sports.The second place for the youngest boys belongs to table tennis and the third to cycling, while older boys prefer cycling in front of table tennis.There is a strong positive correlation among the preferences of individual sports regarding gender for 15 year old boys and girls (rs = .895;p < .001),16 years old (rs = .841;p < .001)and also 17 years old (rs = .841;p < .001).
In regard to team sports, volleyball dominated for girls followed by basketball and handball which however also included another type of ball game similar to dodgeball (TABLE 3).Soccer dominated by far for boys ahead of volleyball and basketball.The hypothesis that Polish adolescents still prefer typical traditional European sports was confi rmed.
There was not such a strong relationship among the preferences of team sports in boys and girls as it was among the preferences of individual sports.In spite of that, the correlation coeffi cient that was found was very high for 15 year old boys and girls (rs = .763;p < .001),and 16 years old (rs = .745;p < .001),and also 17 years old (rs = .754;p < .001).
Among the selected groups of sports boys and girls agreed in preferences of team sports followed by individual sports (Fig. 1).They also corresponded in the placement of outdoor sport activities.The biggest difference in the placement of preferences is recorded in the group of rhythmic and dancing activities, which girls placed on the third place, while boys ranked them last.
A signifi cant diff erence between organized PA participation (expressed in hours of participation) and preferences of individual sports was found in boys (U = 2.32; p = .021;d = .20)and girls (U = 2.20; p = .028;d = .19).In regard to team sports, there was a signifi cant difference only in girls (U = 3.18; p = .002;d = .26).It in dicates that preferences of individual sports in boys and girls and team sports in girls are associated with par ticipation in organized PA (expressed in hours of par ticipation).
The most frequently practiced unorganized PA during the summer season was soccer for boys and swimming for girls (TABLE 4).Organized PA is such a physical activity with an organized group that has a coach, instructor, or leader.Further, during winter both boys and girls indicate skiing activities as their most frequent ones (downhill, cross-country, and snowboarding).

DISCUSSION
Taking various age groups into consideration, we are able to anticipate potential development, possibly the stability of preferred sport activities within the preference structure.This research conducted with the population of Polish adolescents indicates gender diff erences and the biggest variation in preferences for the group of individual and team sport activities.
The preference of swimming over other individual sports is obvious even without respect to participants' age and gender.Very good ranking of cycling and athle tics (including running activities) corresponds to the current trends (Frömel, Novosad, & Svozil, 1999;Kudláček, 2010).Sport gymnastics (understood by adolescents in broader terms as gymnastic activities) ranked third by 15 year old girls indicates the importance of including gymnastic exercises to schools and out of school sport facilities.The trend of decreasing preferences of sports gymnastics with age is obvious and results from foreign studies also confi rm a decreasing interest in gymnastic activities (Hill & Cleven, 2005).A factor that sig nificantly influences the structure of preferences may be identifi ed especially in the case of gymnastics.Kudláček (2010) explains the preference structure of the Czech population at the same age in his research where adolescents of various ages ranked sports gymnastics last.The factor that shapes personality during socialization since early childhood is cultural environment and habits.Diff erences in preferences of sports gymnastics between boys and girls require, especially during co-ed exercises, respect of interest in diff erent gymnastic disciplines and exercises.The basic gymnastic exercises are hardly exchanged by other types of physical activities when providing for kinetic accomplishments of adolescents.Regarding gender, there was a strong correlation among preferences of individual sports that was also found by Kudláček (2010), who examined the particular topic in Czech adolescents.Regarding preferences of team sports, it was surprising that boys preferred volleyball rather than basketball.It is expected that the popularity of fl oorball in Poland will grow for both boys and girls.The popularity of typical European sports off ers a solid ground for eff ective exercising and PE, for the creation of the foundation for lifelong use of these games in simpler form and also for the use of their psychosocial benefi ts.The popularity of soccer in boys' preference sphere is a challenge for all types of schools and their teachers to maximally use soccer to fulfi ll the broadest variety of standards and competences that are required by school curricula.Using soccer only as a tool for satisfaction from PA or a tool to create a good psychosocial environment and thus fulfi ll boys' wishes is absolutely insuffi cient.
The correlation among preferences of individual sports and participation in organized PA (and moreover team sports in girls) may suggest that those who prefer these sports usually have bigger opportunities to participate in organized PA or contrary, this participation in organized PA positively infl uences their relationship to these sports.Therefore, this might be a tool that could help us to fi ght eff ectively against physical inactivity.Respecting the relationships among preferences and organized PA and its consecutive application in educational units should enable us to prepare conditions to enhance PA in adolescent population.For boys soccer absolutely dominates in organized PA while for girls it is volleyball.These fi ndings correspond to fi ndings of Bartoszewicz and Frömel (2006) as they discovered that sports games ranked fi rst in orderliness for Polish adolescents during 2002-2003.Attempts to promote participation in any kind of PA are more eff ective when they aim at needs and interests (indeed preferences) of particular target groups.Thus it is a systematic approach to the problems of PA in the context of preference sphere.In this regard, schools have a special opportunity to infl uence and motivate chil dren and adolescents in the fi eld of physical activity and healthy lifestyle.
Regular diagnostics of the preference structure of PA and preferences of sport activities of particular high school students should be undoubtedly important components to improve the current situation regarding prevalence of physical activity and healthy lifestyle.That is also expressed in other studies related to the fi eld of preferences of physical or sport activities (Booth, Bauman, Owen, & Gore, 1997;Burgeson, Wechsler, Brener, Young, & Spain, 2003;Burke, Carron, & Eys, 2006;Tammelin, Nayha, Hills, & Jarvelin, 2003;Wilson & Spink, 2009).Respecting sport preferences in the development of movement skills and fi tness is seen as typical in school PE in the modern approach of educational process because the center of our educational attention is especially the student (Jones & Ward, 1998;Virgilio, 2000).

Strengths and weaknesses of the study
The main contribution of the research is the practical verifi cation of the opportunity to use the online system for research in sport preferences area -INDARES.Another strength of the study was its ability to provide the school managements and PE teachers with immediate feedback related to sport preferences of their students.
One of the limitations of the study is the section, where students express their participation in organized PA in their free time.The online version of questionnaire does not give the option to diff erentiate the organized PA in free time at school (extracurricular school PA lead by the teacher) from the organized PA outside school.To certain degree, another limitation might be that the completion of questionnaires took place at various times during the school year and not during vacation when students engage in diff erent sport activities than they do during the school year.That could infl uence the selection of sport preferences.

CONCLUSIONS
The most preferred individual sport in 15 to 17 year old boys and girls is swimming.Regarding team sports, boys prefer soccer, volleyball, and basketball.Girls, on the other hand, prefer volleyball, basketball, and handball (including a game similar to dodgeball).Boys and girls who prefer individual sports and girls who prefer team sports participate more hours in organized PA.Diagnostics of sport preferences sphere in adolescents can contribute to the increased interest in PA and thus contribute to more eff ective and economic improvement of conditions for physical activity of adolescents at and outside of schools.Further research should focus on the relationships among sport preferences, sport-environmental conditions, and level of PA in adolescent boys and girls.

TABLE 1
Sample characteristics

TABLE 2
Legend: M -average point value for rankings, computed for one participant Recorded sports also include a variety of executions and kinetically/physically very similar activities.

TABLE 4
Composition of the most frequent physical activities dur ing winter and summer declared by boys and girls (number of participants in %)