Measuring the Moral Reasoning of Athletes

The University of Idaho's Center for ETHICS (Ethical Theory and Honor in Competition and Sport) is the home for a great deal of both theoretical and action research about moral and ethical reasoning and development in sport. The center's Hahm-Beller Values Choice Inventory (HBVCI) measures moral reasoning in athletes and they have assessed over 80,000 individuals (ranging from high school students through adults) using this instrument and the findings are compelling (more on the findings later).

But one of the items on this survey stood out to me because of its uncanny similarity to the now-famous "hand ball" incident that occurred in the World Cup qualifier game between France and Ireland late last year. Thierry's hand ball led directly to a France score which tied the game and effectively eliminated Ireland from the World Cup. The item on the HBVCI reads as follows:

"Question 1: Male soccer players are allowed to play the ball with any part of their body except the hands or outstretched arms. A soccer player receives a chest high pass and taps the ball to the ground with his hand. The referee does not see this action and the play continues, Because it is the referee's job to see these actions, the player is not obligated to report his foul."

Survey participants are asked to indicate their level of agreement with the last two sentences by noting whether they "Strongly Agree," "Agree," are "Neutral," "Disagree," or "Strongly Disagree." If I am not mistaken, those who strongly agree are demonstrating a lower level of moral reasoning than those who strongly disagree. I think what makes this a worthy point of discussion is that the focus is squarely on the direct connection between decisions made in an athletic setting and the moral development of the athlete making those decisions. This is not about what is "practical" in the game of sport or what behavior seems to best fit in the context of sport as we know it. It's a question that directly accesses someone's moral decision making in an athletic setting.

Overall, their findings (summarized here) show that males in team sports demonstrate the lowest moral reasoning scores. Athletes in individual sports demonstrate higher levels of moral reasoning than those in team sports. And the longer that women are involved in team sport competition, the more their moral reasoning appears to erode.

OK, there are so many directions to move in here and I'll stop for now. Food for thought and a future posting.

Breaking the Unwritten Rule

I was interested to read the comments of the coach of the Yates High School (Houston, TX) boys basketball team after the media and public response to his team's 170-35 shellacking of another team on January 5, 2010. Greg Wise, the coach of this obviously talented team, responded to criticism by saying:

"The real story isn’t getting out, and that’s what hurts me. If you are interested in breaking records, that’s not the main focus of high school sports. That’s not the stuff I’m teaching my kids. Nobody shows me taking kids home in an impoverished area where there is gang violence, or calling kids before school and telling them to get on the bus. Nobody shows them doing study hall before school. It’s crazy.”

His frustration is not unlike that of many whose stories are reported by the media with an eye toward simplicity, sensation, and what will grab the attention of a CNN Headline News viewer. But I have to ask, how would showing his players in study hall contribute to a well-balanced view of this issue? As far as I can figure, the issue at stake is one of sportsmanship, a commitment to the unspoken, unwritten contract that two high school teams enter into when they play each other. That contract, as I see it, includes the assumption that both teams will play hard, play fairly, and will treat each other with respect. Pressing, running the break, and allowing starters to play when you have a 100-point lead is not respect. Even if you are a regular participant in study hall.

I will allow that there is some gray area when it comes to "running up the score." There are countless stories of teams that were soundly beating another team, let up, and then ended up losing the game. But this doesn't look gray to me. It looks as black and white as a Holstein (and smells just as bad). And why do I think this is one of the more blatant acts of unsportsmanship I've seen lately? In part, because it is disregards one of the most important elements of team competition: that the game simply wouldn't exist without the full participation of two teams. The Yates team relied on the other team to even have a game (and the referees too, of course). They couldn't achieve any of their goals if the other team didn't exist, show up, or play. Unlike, say, pole vaulting, they couldn't score their hoped-for 200 points and have it count for anything if there wasn't an opponent (and I don't know enough about international track and field to know whether or not a pole vaulter actually needs to have opponents for his or her vault count, but let's say for argument, that they don't).

We can rationalize such running up the score, particularly in professional sports, for all sorts of reasons. But this coach's rationale is weak at best. In fact, his argument doesn't even address whether or not what his team was wrong. He deflects the issue by saying "My players and I do all of these other admirable things so you should ignore this particular act." Like many "rules of the game," not running up the score is unwritten. And these unwritten rules are most vulnerable to abuse since they are followed only when teams and coaches demonstrate thought, restraint, and discretion. This is REALLY hard in a competitive arena. How do you tell competitive players not to score or to play soft when all of their training has been geared toward the exact opposite?

No doubt, successful athletes have the "killer instinct." Successful professional athletes almost as a rule, need to have that characteristic. But to cultivate that at the high school level to such a degree that the utter humiliation experienced by the other team isn't even recognized, is a disservice to all involved in high school sports. The chance to blow out another team (and resist the temptation) is a great teaching moment. It is an opportune time to instill in players that competition and at least some level of empathy are not mutually exclusive. And it's a great time to demonstrate the honor of respecting another team's presence and participation in the game.

Motivation or Abuse?

Mike Leach, the Texas Tech football coach, was recently fired amid allegations of abuse toward players (really one player in particular). Leach allegedly told an athletic trainer to have a player, who had recently been diagnosed with a concussion, go stand in a dark room and stand alone for the duration of practice. It's not clear to me exactly what the connection there is but there are indications that the player was not on Leach's good side (which I kind of hope is true because if not, I shudder to think of what he might do to players who pissed him off).

The relationship between coach and player can, at its best, be life changing, transformative, and highly educational. But like any other relationship it can go bad. And the potential for it to slide from one of unequal power into abuse is ever-present. Acts like Leach's illustrate what happens when a coach chooses to use his power and act out in a way that has no resemblance to sound discipline or education. Coaches are generally given more freedom to do what they think necessary to help a player and team become "better." When I was a college coach, I secretly loved the idea that every once in awhile I could say to an underperforming player, "get your head out of your ass!" when my faculty friends would likely be hauled into the Provost's office for saying anything resembling that comment to a student. I'm sure that secretly they too would like to walk over to an inattentive (ok, sleeping) student and suddenly bellow into their ear "GET YOUR HEAD OUT OF YOUR ASS!" Alas, only a coach (or a drill sergeant) is given the leeway to say such things and still be applauded as an excellent motivator.

In the context of sports, yelling (and sometimes swearing) at young men and women is not always considered abusive. Occasionally, when it gets excessive (or just too quiet in the gym when the expletive flies) it is considered in bad taste. But rarely abusive. But highly successful coaches (and by successful I don't mean wins and losses as much as helping challenge young men and women to become better people) rarely scream and yell all the time and most certainly, they don't lock their players in a dark room to teach them...something.

As a coach, I didn't assign the dirty jobs to the freshmen. I had everybody do the dirty jobs (myself and my assistants included) and do them together. Coaches who always assign the grunt work to the freshman are thinking that they are somehow helping these newbies earn their stripes. But what are they really learning? And will they learn more by carrying the water themselves than if they do it with an upperclassmen? To me, building team is building a whole team. Not segments of a team in the hopes that they will then come together magically on game day. In fact, instead of letting seniors sit back and get waited on by the freshman, I often assigned seniors and captains some of the least desirable jobs (cleaning the van after a long road trip, for instance). To me, that sent the message that with seniority and power, came responsibility to do things for the entire team. Freshmen saw that and instead of feeling pushed around, saw a future obligation and the notion that leadership was not about directing others to do your work. It was about chipping in and helping the whole team.

To come full circle, you have to wonder what Leach thought he was accomplishing. It seems to be nothing short of retribution or punishment without a modicum of education. Of course, I don't know the full context. But to me, this is one of those things that I'll draw a line in the sand. I -- and many of the outstanding coaches I have come across in my career -- would never consider doing something like what Leach did. And I promise that if I ever get a chance to teach in the classroom, I will never tell a student to get his head out of his ass. Unless of course, I'm teaching veterinary medicine and my student really has his head in his ass.

Lowering the Bar

The University of Tennessee is being investigated by the NCAA for possible recruiting violations that include using "hostesses"; co-eds who, allegedly, have gone to the high school games of prized football recruits to help lure them to the University. While the NCAA appears to be looking into whether this practice violates NCAA recruiting regulations, there are other glaring issues ripe for discussion: Is it ethical for the University to use some of its own female students as objects in the race to land prize recruits? Should institutions of higher education, whose primary missions are indeed educational, utilize tactics that are rooted in sexism and the objectification of women?

College coaches at all levels are masters of looking for -- and sometimes finding -- the recruiting edge. Using attractive female students to entice (straight) male athletes to choose a particular institution is not a new concept and, given how we market professional football today, not a particularly innovative one. Whether it is effective or not is certainly up for debate. Someone would have to do a study that evaluates all of the variables that impact why a particular student-athlete chooses a particular school and then the degree to which that athlete contributes to the team's success. Obviously, no one is going to do that and I don't think anyone is really interested in whether or not it is an effective recruiting tactic. What is obvious is that a lot of folks involved in this type of recruiting, believe it is effective and are not deterred by any possible ethical objectives anyone may have. NCAA regulations have a far better shot at ending such a practice than a sudden and widespread revelation by coaches, administrators, and the "hostesses" themselves that the practice is somehow "wrong."

Some comments to the article in the New York Times about the NCAA investigation reflect what I think some people's initial reaction is: that it's not surprising, nor a big deal, and that it's a cold, hard, fact that some men will pick their college based on their perception of the attractiveness of the women who attend it. It's one thing to put an act into context. It is wholly another thing to rationalize a decision or action that is based on the exploitation of an entire gender. Should institutions of higher education be expected to raise the bar in all aspects of their institution? Or are some of these Division I athletic departments so removed from the institution's mission that it is pointless to try and make that argument?

I don't think it's too much of an expectation for universities and colleges to raise the moral bar here and to stop the use of such recruiting practices. If they don't, we run the risk of the bar getting lower and lower and it's hard to know where that could end. Using women (and an increasing number of men as well) as sexual objects to sell products is hardly uncommon in our country. We do it to sell sport, aftershave and beer. But is it unreasonable to hope that our institutions of higher learning could be a haven from that culture? That their recruiting practices would prepare prospective student-athletes in their selection of a college rather than a six pack?

Whose Call is it Anyway?

There has been some debate about Thierry Henry's "honor" and his admission about the controversial goal that sent Ireland packing and France into the World Cup. Henry admitted after the game that he handled the soccer ball before kicking it to a teammate who then headed the ball into the goal. But by then, the game was history. The referee didn't see the violation, the goal was allowed and one wonders if -- even if some have suggested would have been more honorable -- Henry had assertively turned himself in right then and there, the outcome would have been different.

For the most part, referees and umpires are trained to call what they see. Not what they think might have happened, not what someone told them happened (just think what that would look like with an umpire listening to players, coaches and spectators to determine what actually occurred), and not what they think probably happened. It would have been unprecedented for the referee, in this situation, to have changed his call had Henry come running up to him saying "I fouled, I fouled, it shouldn't be a goal!" It would have put the soccer world (and other sports) on its head.

One of the defining characteristics of most team sports is that each participant has a clearly defined role to play. Players play, coaches coach, spectators spectate, and umpires umpire. When people go outside their role, it makes people nervous. Coaches are often heard telling players who question their decision-making "you play and I coach." I have heard umpires say (and I have said and heard this myself as a former coach and umpire) "Coach, you do the coaching and I'll call the game." So is there any room for people to cross those clearly marked lines?

A purist (or a golfer) might say that there should be room for a player to call a foul on him or herself. For the integrity of the game, the right call is most important and that it would justify people straying outside their closely defined roles. Others, the pragmatists, I guess, believe that allowing that sort of "self-foul calling" is unrealistic and would undermine the game and result in an uneven playing field. After all, the teams that called the most fouls on themselves (or the most honest teams) would clearly be at a disadvantage. No different than most tennis matches, I would argue. But wouldn't that be kind of cool? To allow individual players to call their own foul in a game when they see that the referee has missed it -- and have the referee actually adjust the call accordingly?

Instant replay has addressed the concerns of those who believe the right and most accurate call is critical to the integrity of the game. But where does that leave the integrity of individual players? Both those who try and cover up a foul -- or even more disheartening -- those who own up to the foul but are ignored by the referees.