Professional Careers of the German Olympic Athletes

Abstract

Successful careers in top-performance sports demand large amounts of time and personal resources and normally they take a course parallel to the period of educational and professional qualification. Regarding careers of former top-performance athletes, the question arises as to how far the engagement in top-performance sports has an influence on the professional career path. This article aims to categorize the professional careers of top-performance athletes and to connect them with the subjective ratings of the respondents. This will be carried out by means of objective life-course data of former Olympic athletes. The theoretical approach is based on recent conceptions of life-course research and of professional socialization research. In a postal inquiry of 616 successful German Olympic athletes (male and female) the sports and professional careers were recorded retrospectively. The results show that former top-performance athletes generally have higher educational qualifications and professional positions than the German population. But as there are big differences with regard to the individual career patterns, a typology of professional careers seems to be practical. For that purpose, a classification typology of professional careers was developed using cluster analysis. The engagement in sports rather favours the professional career in its course.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Alfermann, D. and Gross, A. (1998) `Erleben und Bewältigen des Karriereendes im Hochleistungssport' , Leistungssport 28(2): 45-48 .

Bacher, J. (1996) Clusteranalyse, 2nd edn. Munich: Oldenbourg .

Backhaus, K., Erichson, B., Plinke, W. and Weiber, R. (1994) Multivariate Analysemethoden, 7th edn. Berlin: Springer .

Baur, J. (1998) `Hochleistungssportliche Karrieren im Nachwuchsbereich' , Sportwissenschaft 28: 9-26 .

Beamish, R. (1990) `The Persistance of Inequality: An Analysis of Participation Patterns Among Canada's High Performance Athletes' , International Review for the Sociology of Sport 25: 143-152 .

Büch, M.-P. (2002) `Elite Sport', in R. Naul and K. Hardman (eds) Sport and Physical Education in Germany. London: Routledge .

Conzelmann, A. (2001) Sport und Persönlichkeitsentwicklung: Möglichkeiten und Grenzen von Lebenslaufanalysen. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

Conzelmann, A., Gabler, H. and Nagel, S. (2001) Hochleistungssport: Persönlicher Gewinn oder Verlust? Lebensläufe von Olympioniken. Tübingen: Attempto .

Curtis, J. and Ennis, R. (1988) `Negative Consequences of Leaving Competitive Sport? Comparative Findings for Former Elite-Level Hockey Players' , Sociology of Sport Journal 5: 87-106 .

10.

Eisen, G. and Turner, D. (1992) `Myth and Reality: Social Mobility of American Olympic Athletes' , International Review for the Sociology of Sport 27: 165-175 .

11.

Elder, G.H., Jr (1974) Children of the Great Depression: Social Change in Life Experience. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press .

12.

Elder, G.H., Jr (1996) `Human Lives in Changing Societies: Life Course and Developmental Insights', in R.B. Cairns, G.H. Elder, Jr and E.J. Castello (eds) Developmental Sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .

13.

Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 31: 22-57 . Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag.

14.

Földesi, G.S. (1998) `La Vie après le sport de haut niveau en Hongrie hier et aujourd'hui', in R. Seiler, G. Anders and P. Irlinger (eds) La Vie après le sport de haut niveau. Paris: Imprimerie Augustin .

15.

Gabler, H. (1997) `Olympische Sieger und Siegerinnen: Was ist aus ihnen geworden, wo sind sie geblieben?', in O. Grupe (ed.) Olympischer Sport: Rückblick und Perspektiven. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

16.

Ganzeboom, H.B.G. and Treiman, D.J. (1996) `Internationally Comparable Measures of Occupational Status for the 1988 International Standard Classification of Occupations' , Social Science Research 25: 201-239 .

17.

Gebauer, G., Braun, S., Suaud, C. and Faure, J.-M. (1999) Die soziale Umwelt von Spitzensportlern: Ein Vergleich des Spitzensports in Deutschland und Frankreich. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

18.

Gordon, A.D. (1999) Classification, 2nd edn. Boca Raton, LA: Chapman & Hall .

19.

Gukenbiehl, H.L. (1998) `Bildung und Bildungssystem', in B. Schäfers and W. Zapf (eds) Handwörterbuch zur Gesellschaft Deutschlands. Opladen: Leske & Budrich .

20.

Hackfort, D., Emrich, E. and Papathanassiou, V. (1997) Nachsportliche Karriereverläufe. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

21.

Heinz, W.R. (1995) Arbeit, Beruf und Lebenslauf: Eine Einführung in die berufliche Sozialisation. Weinheim: Juventa .

22.

Hoffmeyer-Zlotnik, J.H.P. (1998) ` “Beruf” und “Stellung im Beruf” als Indikatoren für Soziale Schichtung', in W. Ahrens, B.-M. Bellach and K. H. Jöckel (eds) Messung soziodemographischer Merkmale in der Epidemiologie. Munich: Medizin-Verlag .

23.

International Labour Office (1990) International Standard Classification of Occupations: ISCO-88. Geneva: ILO .

24.

Jackson, S.A., Dover, J. and Mayocchi, L. (1998) `Life After Winning Gold: I. Experiences of Australian Olympic Gold Medallists' , Sport Psychologist 12: 119-136 .

25.

Kaufman, L. and Rousseeuw, P.J. (1990) Finding Groups in Data. New York: Wiley .

26.

Kneyer, W. (1980) Spitzensport und soziale Mobilität. Ahrensburg: Czwalina .

27.

Koukouris, K. (1991) `Disengagement of Advanced and Elite Greek Male Athletes from Organized Competitive Sport' , International Review for the Sociology of Sport 26: 289-306 .

28.

Lehnertz, K. (1979) Berufliche Entwicklung der Amateurspitzensportler in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

29.

Lötscher, F., Roth, H.W. and Weber, M. (1979) `Spitzensport und Beruf', in H. Gabler, H. Eberspächer, E. Hahn, J. Kern and G. Schilling (eds) Praxis der Psychologie im Leistungssport. Berlin: Bartels & Wernitz .

30.

Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 31: 7-21 . Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag .

31.

Nagel, S. (2002) Medaillen im Sport: Erfolg im Beruf? Berufskarrieren von Hochleistungssportlerinnen und Hochleistungssportlern. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

32.

Patriksson, G. (1995) The Elite Sports Career. Mölndal, Sweden: Department of Education and Educational Research, University of Göteborg (Sport Pedagogical Reports, 48).

33.

Richartz, A. and Brettschneider, W.-D. (1996) Weltmeister werden und die Schule schaffen. Schorndorf: Hofmann .

34.

Sinclair, D. and Orlick, T. (1993) `Positive Transition from High-Performance Sport' , Sport Psychologist 7: 138-150 .

35.

Sørensen, A.B., Weinert, F.E. and Sherrod, L.R. (eds) (1986) Human Development and the Life Course. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum .

36.

Svoboda, B. and Vanek, M. (1982) `Retirement from High Level Competition', in T. Orlick, J.T. Partington and J.H. Salmela (eds) Mental Training: For Coaches and Athletes. Ottawa: Coaching Association of Canada and Sport in Perspective Inc .

37.

Treiman, D.J. (1977) Occupational Prestige in Comparative Perspective. New York: Academic Press .

38.

Werthner, P. and Orlick, T. (1986) `Retirement Experiences of Successful Olympic Athletes' , International Journal of Sport Psychology 17: 337-363 .

39.

Weymann, A. and Heinz, W.R. (eds) (1996) Society and Biography: Interrelationships between Social Structure and the Life Course. Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag .

40.

Wolf, C. (1998) `Zur Messung des sozialen Status in epidemiologischen Studien: Ein Vergleich unterschiedlicher Ansätze', in W. Ahrens, B.-M. Bellach and K.H. Jöckel (eds) Messung soziodemographischer Merkmale in der Epidemiologie. Munich: Medizin-Verlag .