The final frontier of anti-doping: A study of athletes who have committed doping violations

Although the use of banned drugs in sport is not a new phenomenon, little is known about the experiences and perceptions of athletes who have committed anti-doping rule violations. This study qualitatively explored the experiences of 18 athletes (from the sports of bodybuilding, powerlifting, cricket, sprint kayak, rugby league, and swimming) who had committed anti-doping violations. Themes explored included motivations for initiating and maintaining doping, the psychology of doping, deterrents to doping, and views on current anti-doping policy. In most cases doping had started early in their careers. The perceived culture of the sport was considered central to the ‘normalization’ of doping, particularly in bodybuilding. When explaining their decision to dope, athletes engaged in processes or moral disengagement (including advantageous comparison, minimizing consequences and diffusion of responsibility). Ironically, moral arguments were perceived as the most effective deterrents to doping. Findings are discussed in relation to the difficulties in establishing credible deterrents and suggestions for the future development of anti-doping policy.     

Inside the locker room: a qualitative study of coaches’ anti-doping knowledge,beliefs and attitudes

It is widely assumed that coaches have an effect on athletes’ doping behaviours; however, the means by which this influence can be manifested are only superficially understood. The present study seeks to understand how coaches see their role in directly and indirectly influencing the doping attitudes and behaviours of athletes. Fourteen elite-level coaches participated in focus group discussions. Coaches displayed a low level of knowledge of banned methods and practices. While it was acknowledged that doping was prevalent in sport, coaches believed that doping was not a problem in their own sport, since doping does not aid in the development or implementation of sporting ‘skills’. While the findings suggest that coaches support the revised WADA Code, with increased sanctions for coaches, the findings also highlight how coaches may indirectly and inadvertently condone doping. This may be through inaction or the apparent endorsement of pro-doping expectancies.     

Doping control in sport: An investigation of how elite athletes perceive and trust the functioning of the doping testing system in their sport

Doping testing is a key component enforced by anti-doping authorities to detect and deter doping in sport. Policy is developed to protect athletes’ right to participate in doping-free sport; and testing is a key tool to secure this right. Accordingly, athletes’ responses to anti-doping efforts are important. This article explores how the International Standards for Testing, which face different interpretations and challenges when policy is implemented, are perceived by elite athletes. Particularly, this article aims to investigate how elite athletes perceive the functioning of the testing system (i.e., the efforts of stakeholders involved in testing) in their own sport both nationally and worldwide. Moreover, it seeks to identify whether specific factors such as previous experience of testing and perceived proximity of doping have an impact on athletes’ perceptions of the testing system. The study comprises a web-based questionnaire (N = 645; response rate 43%) and uses qualitative findings to elaborate on and explain quantitative results. Results showed that two-thirds of the athletes reported the national testing programme in their sport to be appropriate. A majority of the athletes who had an opinion on the subject regarded testing programmes in some countries as not extensive enough or believed that in certain countries doping control was downgraded to win medals. Past experience of testing seemed to have a positive influence on trust in the concrete measures; however, if athletes experienced flaws during the control procedures, this could increase distrust and cause worry. The proximity of doping in an athlete's sport influenced the athlete's perception of the testing system. Particularly, athletes who need the testing system to be effective and to function well across the world show greater distrust of or dissatisfaction with the current testing system. The athletes’ diverging views indicate that contemporary anti-doping policy is simultaneously met with support, (dis)trust and frustration. By integrating the views and experiences of Danish elite athletes, this study confirms that the current testing system is confronted with obstacles, and it contributes knowledge about some of the challenges WADA faces when policy is implemented. Implications of results and recommendations for anti-doping authorities are outlined in the paper.     

The doping self-reporting game: The paradox of a ‘false-telling’ mechanism and its potential research and policy implications

Establishing a requirement for, justifying public spending on, and evaluating the effectiveness of anti-doping policies all accentuate the need for reliable estimates of doping prevalence in sport. To date, despite considerable effort and much empirical research, this critical information is still not available. Methodological concerns that make doping epidemiology research difficult have been noted, and to some degree addressed in relation to under-reporting bias. In this paper, we use a simple game model to outline a potential responding behaviour among self-reporting athletes on the use of doping that could potentially invalidate any prevalence estimation arising from self-reports. We show a paradoxical situation in which a potential strategic behaviour inevitably leads to a game where the ‘lying’ is a dominant strategy for both doping users and non-users. A slightly more advanced look at the situation might possibly alter this seemingly absurd conclusion, however not in a direction offering any easy solutions for empirical doping research. Although we acknowledge that the proportions of respondents engaging in false telling are likely to vary across samples and differ between doping users and clean athletes, our simple model effectively draws attention to a neglected side of evasive responding in surveys. The response bias that potentially could lead to under- and over-reporting should be considered when self-reported prevalence rates are used to inform anti-doping prevention and intervention policies. Survey methodologies that are able to account for potential distortions would make a considerable contribution to doping research.     

Basic values predict doping likelihood

ABSTRACT

Basic values, defined as trans-situational goals that vary in importance and act as guiding principles in life, have been linked with unethical cognitions, emotions and actions. Their roles in doping, a form of cheating in sport, have yet to established. College athletes reported doping likelihood in hypothetical scenario-based situations and completed measures of basic values, moral disengagement, and anticipated guilt. Correlation analysis showed that doping likelihood was positively associated with self-enhancement values but negatively associated with self-transcendence values and conservation values. Moral disengagement correlated positively with self-enhancement values and negatively with self-transcendence values, whereas guilt correlated positively conservation values and negatively with self-enhancement values and openness to change values. Regression analyses showed that self-enhancement values positively predicted doping likelihood directly, self-transcendence values negatively predicted doping likelihood indirectly via moral disengagement and guilt, and conservation values negatively predicted doping likelihood indirectly via guilt. In line with theory and evidence concerning the relationship between basic value systems and moral thought and action, we found that the values of athletes are directly (self-enhancement) and indirectly (self-transcendence, conservation) linked with likely use of banned performance enhancing substances, an expression of cheating in sport.     

Use of performance-enhancing drugs and the Internet

The use of physical performance-enhancing drugs is not limited to professional sports only, but has also been reported as common practice in recreational sports. A significant amount of epidemiological studies have highlighted the collective of fitness center visitors to be a high-risk group for using performance-enhancing drugs. From a sociological perspective, however, the decision to use performance-enhancing drugs (e.g., doping in the context of high-performance sport) is not an individual phenomenon only, but rather a result of social opportunity structures. This research article gives insight into enhancing-related Internet forums, in which the expertise of using and applying substances is passed on step by step. Using selected criminological learning theories, the “doping talk” in these social networks is hermeneutically reanalyzed and the Internet is exposed as a previously under-analyzed option for acquiring knowledge on the use of performance-enhancing drugs. This article shows that users of “doping platforms” are highly informed about doping and this offer of information acts like a knock-on effect to athletes who have so far abstained from doping. Consequently, future prevention models against the abuse of performance-enhancing drugs should consider the subcultural background of the milieu in which the athletes act.     

竞技体育领域道德风险若干问题探究

竞技体育道德风险问题对竞技体育的健康、持续发展带来了诸多不利影响,通过对竞技体育道德风险的概念描述及其特征,根据竞技体育行为主体逃避或违犯的各种制度或规范的种类,将目前竞技体育的道德风险分为政策性道德风险、赛场性道德风险、公益性道德风险和自我性道德风险四大类。认为产生道德风险的原因主要有:竞技体育法律制约机制不健全;竞技体育道德风险防范管理机制的不健全;竞技体育行为主体的道德素质有待提高等。     

Intentional Rules Violations—One More Time

A familiar move that philosophers of sport make in the debate on the doping-issue is to reject from the start the argument that doping comes down to cheating. The claim that doping is cheating is often rebutted with the argument that doping is only cheating when one accepts that the use of doping is unjustified in itself. In this paper I want to argue that putting aside the cheating-argument in this way comes, first, too easy, because essential complexities of what cheating is, are neglected. And, second, it comes too soon, because spelling the cheating argument out throws new light on the debate about matters of justifying the rules and criteria concerning doping. I will confine myself in this paper to the claim that it is in any case the institutional authorities that professional athletes cheat on. The relations with other parties that apparently can be claimed to be cheated upon also, such as other athletes in competition, are left out. The argument from cheating takes its starting point from a principle of fidelity, taken from Scanlon. By this principle the morally acceptable conduct of those taking part in a practice is grounded in the way reciprocal expectations are raised between parties to the practice. I apply this principle to the relation between athletes and institutional authorities in sport practices. This argument can take the cheating argument to a new level of seriousness, especially in the sense that the arguments treated here support a plea for democratization of the procedures and a larger role of the sportsmen and sportswomen themselves, or so I will defend.     

反兴奋剂教育要从青少年运动员抓起

青少年是一个国家的希望,我国一向重视青少年运动员反兴奋剂教育工作。中共中央国务院《关于加强青少年体育增强青少年体质的意见》中明确指出:"广大青少年身心健康、体魄强健、意志坚强、充满活力,是一个民族旺盛生命力的体现,是社会文明进步的标志,是国家综合实力的重要方面。"由于青少年运动员年龄小,对反兴奋剂知识了解较少,对使用兴奋剂的行为缺乏鉴别能力,容易发生兴奋剂问题。因此,加强青少年反兴奋     

The moral worth of sport reconsidered: contributions of recreational sport and competitive sport to life aspirations and psychological well-being

Based on self-determination theory, the present study aimed to test the hypothesis that importance ratings of life aspirations would mediate the effects of participation in recreational and competitive sport on psychological well-being. In addition, the effects of sport participation on psychological well-being were hypothesized to indicate that, compared with competitive athletes, recreational athletes would report higher psychological well-being. The participants were 118 university students (83 males, 35 females) with a mean age of 20.8 years (s = 7.6). In accordance with the initial hypotheses, a path analysis supported the mediating effect of importance ratings of life aspirations, but not of attainment ratings of life aspirations, on the relationship between participation in recreational and competitive sport and psychological well-being. The indirect effects observed for importance ratings supported the conclusion that recreational athletes showed a preference for intrinsic life aspirations compared with competitive athletes and reported higher psychological well-being. Overall, the findings of the present study suggest that the moral worth of sport does not reside so much in the frequency with which individuals engage in sport but in the goals and values people express through sport participation.     

Moral Reasoning in Sport: Implications for Physical Education

ABSTRACT

This paper involves a discussion of the results of a recent research project where I interviewed athletes who play on a Canadian University's sport teams. The interviews were fairly open‐ended, exploring the athletes’ interpretations of what makes a situation an ethical dilemma and then what moral reasoning process they use in resolving the dilemmas they face. The interviews were analysed utilizing a hermeneutic approach. In analysing the transcribed interviews, I uncovered the layers of text in an attempt to interpret the athletes’ conception of ethical dilemmas. Then I focused on the reasoning process the athletes articulated in their attempts to resolve ethical dilemmas. This process required successive ‘readings’ where I attempted to relate knowledge from moral theory/moral philosophy to the words and experiences of the athletes interviewed.

This research has the potential to be both theoretically and practically significant. The theoretical significance of the research lies in the application of a study of moral theory/moral philosophy to actual ethical dilemmas faced by athletes. Although moral philosophy is a well‐established scholarly discipline, the application of insights gleaned from a study of this discipline to the practice of sport has not received much attention in the scholarly literature. Most of the empirical research conducted in the area of sport and moral reasoning has focused on theories of moral development, i.e. Piaget, Kohlberg, and so forth (Booth, 1981; Figley, 1984; Romance, 1988; Brandi, 1989; Shields & Bredemeier, 1995), while most of the research concerned with moral theory/moral philosophy has been solely conceptual in nature (Shea, 1996; Arnold, 1984; Fraleigh, 1984; Zeigler, 1984; Feezell, 1986). The research presented in this paper integrates a naturalistic framework, specifically hermeneutic analysis, with conceptual knowledge derived from moral theory/moral philosophy.

The research also has the potential to have significant practical implications. My objective is to determine what sort of moral reasons athletes provide when they attempt to resolve ethical dilemmas encountered in their sport. Understanding these reasons has significant implications in that teachers and coaches could facilitate the development of the critical thinking skills and dispositions required in moral reasoning if they were aware of where their athletes were in need of guidance.

     

‘The Event That Shook the Whole World Up’: Historicizing the 1983 Pan-American Games Doping Scandal

Abstract

In August of 1983 at the Pan-American Games in Caracas, Venezuela, a multi-faceted doping crisis occurred that overshadowed all other aspects of the games. This essay marks the first attempt to historicize the events surrounding this watershed moment in the fight against drug use in sport. Doping was revealed in three ways in Caracas: by the large number of positive tests that resulted in the first loss to doping of medals in the history of the Pan-American Games, by the exodus of the 12 American track and field athletes who flew home rather than be subject to testing in the sophisticated lab run by Dr Manfred Donike, and by a rash of ‘injuries’ and unexpectedly poor performances that kept athletes out of the medals and thus out of Donike’s lab. In the aftermath of the games, the United States Olympic Committee implemented new policies to ensure that Americans competing in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games would not run the risk of similar public embarrassment.     

The moral worth of sport reconsidered: Contributions of recreational sport and competitive sport to life aspirations and psychological well-being

Abstract

Based on self-determination theory, the present study aimed to test the hypothesis that importance ratings of life aspirations would mediate the effects of participation in recreational and competitive sport on psychological well-being. In addition, the effects of sport participation on psychological well-being were hypothesized to indicate that, compared with competitive athletes, recreational athletes would report higher psychological well-being. The participants were 118 university students (83 males, 35 females) with a mean age of 20.8 years (s = 7.6). In accordance with the initial hypotheses, a path analysis supported the mediating effect of importance ratings of life aspirations, but not of attainment ratings of life aspirations, on the relationship between participation in recreational and competitive sport and psychological well-being. The indirect effects observed for importance ratings supported the conclusion that recreational athletes showed a preference for intrinsic life aspirations compared with competitive athletes and reported higher psychological well-being. Overall, the findings of the present study suggest that the moral worth of sport does not reside so much in the frequency with which individuals engage in sport but in the goals and values people express through sport participation.     

Predicting elite Scottish athletes’ attitudes towards doping: examining the contribution of achievement goals and motivational climate

Understanding athletes’ attitudes to doping continues to be of interest for its potential to contribute to an international anti-doping system. However, little is known about the relationship between elite athletes’ attitudes to drug use and potential explanatory factors, including achievement goals and the motivational climate. In addition, despite specific World Anti-Doping Agency Code relating to team sport athletes, little is known about whether sport type (team or individual) is a risk or protective factor in relation to doping. Elite athletes from Scotland (N = 177) completed a survey examining attitudes to performance-enhancing drug (PED) use, achievement goal orientations and perceived motivational climate. Athletes were generally against doping for performance enhancement. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that task and ego goals and mastery motivational climate were predictors of attitudes to PED use (F (4, 171) = 15.81, P < .01). Compared with individual athletes, team athletes were significantly lower in attitude to PED use and ego orientation scores and significantly higher in perceptions of a mastery motivational climate (Wilks’ lambda = .76, F = 10.89 (5, 170), P < .01). The study provides insight into how individual and situational factors may act as protective and risk factors in doping in sport.     

Sport and doping: from WADA’s monopoly to collective arrangements and new model of anti-doping

Abstract

On April 1, 2018, the new standards of compliance to the code of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) came into force. The new standards impact all sports. An important amendment has been made to an article of the existing code ‘Additional Roles and Responsibility of the Parties’. Now, all international federations and the unions in agreement with WADA are obliged to reject applications for holding all sporting events from countries that do not comply with the WADA code. By then, Russian elite sport remained in isolation because the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) had no license from WADA until a compromise agreement allowed Russia back into international sports in September 2018. The probability of obtaining permanent return to international sport was extremely low. In order to obtain the license, Russian sport authorities were asked to agree with the reports of Professor McLaren and to admit the existence of doping support in the country at the state level, which seemed improbable. In Russia, although the new standards of the World Anti-Doping Agency code have not caused special concerns it directly impact Russian elite sport. Unless certain conditions were met by 2019, there was a high probability that Russia would not be able to attend large international competitions in the near future, including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The situation dictates the choice of the new strategy of development for Russian sport and new model for the fight against doping, which can be not dependent on WADA. To date, there have been no real checks on WADA’s authority other than occasional decisions in the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Academics who are critical of WADA’s functions often find themselves marginalized when the purported global doping “crisis” should bring “all hands on deck” to provide a humanistic and scientific approach that is best for athletes past, present and future. The functions of WADA in investigating, charging and punishing athletes do not contribute to sustainable development of sport and the sports industry around the world, and create unipolar environment of influence on sports development. Therefore, in this article, we describe some alternative forms and new order of regulation of the anti-doping relations in sport.     

运动道德判断的研究评述

道德判断是道德发展的主要标志,是道德认知的核心,研究运动员的道德观念及其认知特点,对于提高其道德发展,推动体育运动的健康发展具有重要影响。回顾了多数国内外对运动道德判断的研究,将其归纳为以下几方面进行评述:(1)人口学变量与运动道德判断的研究;(2)运动员与非运动员道德判断差异的研究;(3)体育领域道德判断测验的开发;(4)青少年运动员道德判断阶段的探究。     

Determinants of athletes’ moral competence: the role of demographic characteristics and sport-related perceptions

The aim of the present study was to examine whether demographic characteristics and perceptions regarding sport-ability and sport-league affect one’s moral competence. A total of 685 athletes from five different sports participated in the study. The moral competence test was used, in order to assess players’ moral competence. Also, players’ sport-related perceptions and demographic data were reported. The ANOVAs revealed that athletes of individual sports and sports with no and/or low physical contact scored significantly higher in moral competence compared to team sport athletes who compete in high-contact sports. Moreover, players’ age, education, sport experience and perceived sport ability were found to play a significant role in moral development, while their level of competition, and gender did not have a significant effect on their morality. Overall, results demonstrated that several demographic characteristics and sport-related perceptions should be taken into account when interpreting ones’ moral profile.     

Sport supplement use predicts doping attitudes and likelihood via sport supplement beliefs

The aim of this study was to examine: 1) whether sport supplement use is related to doping and 2) whether sport supplement beliefs mediated this relationship. In Study 1, athletes (N = 598), completed measures of sport supplement use, sport supplement beliefs, and doping attitudes. In Study 2, athletes (N = 475) completed measures of sport supplement use, sport supplement beliefs, and doping likelihood. In both studies, sport supplement use predicted doping outcomes indirectly via sport supplement beliefs. Our findings provide novel evidence to suggest that sport supplement users, who strongly believe that sport supplements are effective, are more likely to dope. For anti-doping organisations wishing to prevent doping, targeting an athlete’s beliefs about sport supplements may improve the effectiveness of anti-doping prevention programmes.     

The role of self-regulatory efficacy,moral disengagement and guilt on doping likelihood: A social cognitive theory perspective

Given the concern over doping in sport, researchers have begun to explore the role played by self-regulatory processes in the decision whether to use banned performance-enhancing substances. Grounded on Bandura’s (1991) theory of moral thought and action, this study examined the role of self-regulatory efficacy, moral disengagement and anticipated guilt on the likelihood to use a banned substance among college athletes. Doping self-regulatory efficacy was associated with doping likelihood both directly (b = ?.16, P < .001) and indirectly (b = ?.29, P < .001) through doping moral disengagement. Moral disengagement also contributed directly to higher doping likelihood and lower anticipated guilt about doping, which was associated with higher doping likelihood. Overall, the present findings provide evidence to support a model of doping based on Bandura’s social cognitive theory of moral thought and action, in which self-regulatory efficacy influences the likelihood to use banned performance-enhancing substances both directly and indirectly via moral disengagement.