Benefits of sport will outscore the recession

YOUR columnist Matt Cooper (October 29) paints a delightful picture of him and his children enjoying an Irish autumn. He highlights lessons regarding how easy it is to enhance psychological development through physical activity.

In sport, such activity can be seen as a platform, a structured environment, from which to learn the skills associated with personality values such as:

- Responsibility

- Conformity

- Perseverance

- Risk-taking

- Courage

- Self-control

A wide range of skills that are important in maintaining healthy social relationships can be learned and practised while engaging in sporting activity.

Such skills include:

- Goal-setting

- Effective communication

- Dealing with conflict

- Problem-solving

- Expressing and regulating emotions

- Providing and receiving feedback

- Identifying a role in a team

- Managing stress.

These are all core components of sporting activities. Sport in all its guises, and whether played for fun or profit, is ultimately about relating and relationships – metrics that will outlive any recession.

Dr Patrick Ryan

Department of Education and Professional Studies

University of Limerick