1. Introduction
In their seminal study, Felitti and colleagues [
1] demonstrated the far-reaching adult health outcomes associated with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). This initial inquiry sparked a line of research that has produced a plethora of studies in sociology, psychology, and public health investigating ACEs and their correlates [
2,
3,
4]. In the years since Felitti et al.’s [
1] investigation into ACEs and adult health outcomes, two findings have consistently been observed in the literature: (1) ACEs are pervasive, and (2) there appears to be a dose-response relationship between ACEs and negative health outcomes in adulthood. Felitti et al. [
1] initially found that more than half (52%) of respondents reported at least one ACE in their study. More recently, Merrick et al. [
5] found that in a sample of 140,000 individuals across 25 states in the U.S., 60.9% of participants experienced at least one type of ACE and 15.6% reported four or more. Some particularly striking results from Felitti et al.’s [
1] study were that individuals who had experienced four or more ACEs were 4 to 12 times more likely to experience alcoholism, drug abuse, depression, and suicide attempts when compared to participants who had experienced no ACEs [
1]. Research has continued to demonstrate that with increased ACEs, individuals are at greater risk for substance abuse, depression and anxiety, and suicide [
6,
7,
8]. As such, it appears that ACEs are playing a significant role in the mental health of U.S. adults.
There has been a paucity of literature related to ACEs and student-athlete mental health outcomes. Research exploring the relationship between ACEs and student-athlete mental health outcomes may help inform practice for sport psychology practitioners, coaches, mental health therapists, educators, and other professionals who may work closely with both student-athletes and non-student-athletes. The results of such research may help to create a positive environment for the psychosocial development of individuals across their academic and athletic experiences.
1.1. Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)
ACEs traditionally encompass one’s exposure to events such as physical, sexual, or emotional abuse; physical or emotional neglect; and household dysfunction (e.g., witnessing domestic violence). To reiterate and expand on the correlations between health outcomes and ACEs that were mentioned earlier, research has indicated that the more ACEs one is exposed to in childhood, the more likely they are to endorse problematic alcohol use [
1,
9], drug abuse [
1,
9], depression [
1,
9,
10], suicide attempts [
1,
9], smoking, poor self-rated health, more than 50 sexual intercourse partners, sexually transmitted diseases, physical inactivity, severe obesity, ischemic heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease, skeletal fractures, liver disease [
1], chronic fatigue, and sleep problems [
10]. This wide array of adult health concerns that have been correlated with ACEs has led to some scholars stating that “at least a third of mental and behavioral disorders can be attributed to ACEs” [
4] (p. 182).
Danese and McEwen [
11] suggest that stressful childhood experiences may impact biological processes, affecting physiological responses to stress in adulthood. The human body has evolved to maintain stability through adaptation of the nervous, endocrine, and immune systems in response to environmental and physiological changes. The process by which the body seeks to preserve homeostasis through changes in its functioning is known as allostasis [
11]. Psychosocial stressors (e.g., a psychologically abusive parent) may induce changes in these highly integrated allostatic systems (e.g., initiation of the “fight-or-flight” response), which in the short term may be adaptive and functional to manage a stressor but detrimental to physical and mental health in the long term if allostatic systems are chronically activated. Indeed, such repeated and sustained exposure to psychosocial stressors has been linked to detrimental physiological outcomes [
11]. This “wear and tear” due to chronic stress is known as allostatic load [
11].
In childhood, ACEs may cause prolonged physiological responses in allostatic systems, increasing allostatic load and negatively impacting physiological and psychological development. However, Danese and McEwen [
11] point out that many factors may affect the outcomes observed in adulthood following ACE exposure. Namely, (1) the nature of the childhood adversity (e.g., when the ACE(s) occurred, what type of ACE(s) were experienced, the number of times an ACE or ACEs was/were endured, etc.), (2) individual resilience and vulnerability factors such as one’s genetics and previous experiences, and (3) even though ACEs can affect the development of multiple allostatic systems (multifinality), any number of factors could have similar effects (equifinality), which may decrease or increase the relationship between ACEs and allostatic load [
11].
Involvement in athletics may represent one such factor that could serve to buffer or potentiate the relationship between ACEs and allostatic load. Athletics may protect against ACEs due to the opportunities to engage in regular exercise, get involved with a group of peers (possibly increasing social support), have adult mentors (e.g., coaches), and/or engage with a pleasurable activity. However, these same factors could potentiate the relationship between ACEs and allostatic load should individuals experience a negative team culture (e.g., bullying), have hypercritical coaches, feel undue pressure to perform at a high level, and/or experience stress due to the time demands placed on them as they advance through sport. Researching how involvement with sport into adulthood is related to mental health, particularly if individuals have been exposed to ACEs, may help illuminate if such a buffering or potentiating relationship exists.
1.2. Depressive Symptoms and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation
When researching collegiate student-athletes and non-student-athletes, two psychological outcomes that are relevant to both ACEs and the student-athlete literature are depression/depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation. Depression is the second most common mental health concern college students report ever being diagnosed with [
12] and the positive correlation between ACEs and depressive symptoms in adulthood has been well-established in the literature [
1,
13]. In fact, in 2020, the Centers for Disease Control in the United States suggested over 2 million cases of depression might be prevented through targeting ACEs [
4]. Research comparing collegiate student-athletes to non-student-athletes [
14,
15] has found student-athletes to display lower levels of depression than non-student-athletes. However, this research has not taken into consideration the ACEs participants may have experienced, which could further contextualize results.
ACEs have also been found to positively predict difficulties in emotion regulation [
16]. This relationship is noteworthy because multiple studies have suggested that emotion regulation ability plays a significant, mediating role between the ACEs one experiences in childhood and the psychological distress they report in adulthood [
16,
17,
18]. Interestingly, when comparing collegiate student-athletes to non-student-athletes, student-athletes appear to have less difficulty regulating their emotions [
15,
19]. Athletics has the potential for helping youth to develop psychological well-being through a variety of means, such as requiring regular physical exercise, increasing social connections/support, and providing ample opportunity to practice regulating emotions in the face of challenging situations. What remains unclear, though, is if ACEs impact the mental health of student-athletes differently than non-student-athletes and/or if athletic involvement may provide a buffer to childhood adversities not observed in non-student-athlete populations. Therefore, athletic involvement appears to decrease the likelihood of experiencing depressive symptoms and increase the ability to regulate emotions in collegiate student-athletes, but it is not clear if this relationship is maintained when examining student-athletes and non-student-athletes who have a history of ACEs.
1.3. ACEs and Student-Athletes
Given the pervasiveness of ACEs, it would seem likely a significant proportion of student-athletes have experienced one or more ACEs. Indeed, in a sample of 477 student-athletes from 55 different colleges/universities, it was found that 64.5% of the sample had experienced at least one ACE and 38.7% experienced two or more [
20]. However, in a separate study of 304 collegiate student-athletes, Kaier et al. [
21] found only 14% of their sample reported a single ACE and only 17% reported multiple ACEs. Just as with non-athletes, research appears to demonstrate negative psychological health outcomes for student-athletes who have experienced ACEs, particularly athletes who have experienced multiple ACEs. The literature examining the consequences of ACEs in student-athletes has found ACEs are associated with increased risk for anxiety, depression, perceived stress, somatization disorder, substance use, insomnia, and prescription medication use, as well as decreased social support, sleep quality, and sleep [
20,
21,
22]. Despite these outcomes, research with high-level student-athletes also seems to indicate that there is a protective factor associated with sport involvement. Kaier et al. [
21] found there to be a buffering effect associated with sport involvement for up to one ACE for collegiate student-athletes. The authors [
21] speculated that regular exercise (which is a requisite of high-level athletics) may provide a protective factor to allostatic load, leading to collegiate student-athletes having a buffer to ACEs while developing as youth. Kaier et al. [
21] recommended exploration into potential mechanisms that may contribute to the relationship between ACEs, allostatic load, and health outcomes. Additionally, they [
21] recommended that direct comparisons with high-level athletes and non-athletes (e.g., collegiate student-athletes and non-student-athletes) in the context of ACEs research could be beneficial to ascertain if high-level athletics is a resilience factor. In accordance with these suggestions, one construct worth investigating in ACEs, student-athletes, and mental health research is hardiness.
1.4. Hardiness
Hardiness is a personality trait that may help researchers and practitioners better understand individuals’ health outcomes in the wake of stressful life events. Kobasa [
23] found that individuals high on hardiness were able to experience high amounts of life stress and were less likely to experience illness than individuals who were low on hardiness. This finding has been replicated for general mental health as well—the lower one’s hardy attitudes are, the greater the likelihood of psychopathology is (e.g., depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder [
24,
25]. Kobasa et al. [
26] outlined the “3C’s” of hardiness as follows:
- (1)
Commitment: Someone’s tendency to involve themselves in whatever they are doing and encounter (rather than alienate themselves).
- (2)
Control: The tendency to feel and act as if one is influential rather than helpless when confronting the various contingencies of life.
- (3)
Challenge: Individuals believe that change rather than stability is normal in life, and anticipating changes is an incentive for growth instead of a threat to security.
Hardiness has been associated with resilience, stress-related growth, good health, and performance under stressful conditions [
23,
24,
27,
28,
29,
30]. Of these associations, a protective factor that has been of particular interest in the mental health literature is resilience. Resilience is one’s ability to experience a highly stressful life event but still be able to maintain healthy psychological and physical functioning after the event. Thus, resilience is a process by which individuals attempt to effectively cope with stressful situations [
31,
32]. Hardiness, however, is a set of personality characteristics that help guide one’s decision-making when handling stressful life events and is generally considered a dispositional response style to stress. Therefore, possessing hardy characteristics may help someone be more likely to act resiliently when faced with stressful life events [
24,
29]. One notion of the student-athlete experience is that participation in athletics may promote resilience in individuals through having to cope with adversity that is inherent in sport. It is worth investigating if endorsement of hardy attitudes (i.e., a pathway to resilience; [
24,
29]) is indeed promoted through sport participation up into adulthood and thereby may increase student-athletes’ resilience to adverse situations (e.g., ACEs).
To date, direct comparisons of hardy attitudes between athletes and non-athletes are minimal, and results are mixed. Skirka [
33] found athletes to score higher on hardiness than non-athletes. However, Kilchrist [
34] found individual athletes to be significantly lower in the challenge dimension of hardiness when compared to non-athletes and team-sport athletes and found no significant differences in total hardiness score between contact athletes, non-contact athletes, and non-athletes. Given the limited research in this area, scholarship that takes into consideration the endorsement of hardy attitudes by student-athletes and non-student-athletes, as well as the ACEs they have experienced, may provide a more comprehensive understanding of mental health outcomes observed within each group when making comparisons between them.
1.5. Present Study
As mentioned, Kaier et al. [
21] suggested that it would be valuable for researchers to directly compare ACEs and adult health outcome data between college student-athletes and non-student-athletes in order to draw inferences about potential resilience factors. Given this recommendation and the authors’ interest in mental health, we chose to examine the associations between ACEs and student-athlete status with depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation, two mental health variables shown to be positively associated with ACEs [
17,
20].
The current study had four objectives. The first objective was to compare depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation in college students with varying levels of ACEs exposure. The second objective was to compare depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation in college student-athletes and non-student-athletes. Third, we wanted to test if ACEs and student-athlete status would uniquely interact when examining depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation in adulthood. Finally, should relationships exist between ACEs and student-athletes’ status with depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation, our fourth objective would be to examine how controlling for hardiness might impact those relationships. Given these objectives, we had four hypotheses:
Hypothesis 1: There will be a significant main effect on participants’ depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation based on the number of ACEs they report.
Hypothesis 2: There will be a significant main effect on participants’ depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation based on their student-athlete status.
Hypothesis 3: There will be a significant interaction between the number of ACEs one experienced and their student-athlete status on depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation.
Hypothesis 4: If significant main effects or an interaction effect are found, controlling for hardiness will lead to there no longer being a significant main effect and/or interaction effect.
3. Results
Descriptive statistics pertaining to depressive symptoms, difficulties in emotion regulation, and hardiness can be found in
Table 1. Rather than use the traditional ACEs grouping categories (i.e., 0, 1, 2, 3, and 4+ ACEs; [
1]), we chose to follow the approach taken by Kaier et al. [
21] and divided participants up into three ACEs groupings: no ACEs (
n = 146), one ACE (
n = 63), and multiple ACEs (
n = 62). This strategy also increased subgroup sizes so that we were better able to make comparisons between subgroups of student-athletes and non-student-athletes than if we used traditional grouping methods. Using this approach, there were 77 student-athletes and 66 non-student-athletes in the no ACEs group, 22 student-athletes and 41 non-student-athletes in the one ACE group, and 23 student-athletes and 39 non-student-athletes in the multiple ACEs group. There was a statistically significant association between student-athlete status and ACEs grouping,
x2(2) = 7.68,
p = 0.021; however it was a relatively weak association, Cramer’s
V = 0.17 [
47]. Results from the chi-square appear to indicate that student-athletes were less likely to experience ACEs than non-student-athletes. For a visual representation of the number of ACEs reported broken down by student-athlete status, see
Figure 1. To see participants’ ACEs grouping broken down by student-athlete status, see
Figure 2.
We first conducted a two-way MANOVA with ACEs grouping and student-athlete status entered as the independent variables and difficulties in emotion regulation (DERS) and depressive symptoms (PHQ-9) entered as the dependent variables. There was a total of 260 participants included in this analysis. There was a statistically significant main effect between participants on the combined dependent variables based on ACEs grouping,
F(4, 506) = 11.47,
p < 0.001, Wilks’ Λ = 0.84, partial
η2 = 0.08, 1 −
β = 1.00, as well as student-athlete status,
F(2, 253) = 9.85,
p < 0.001, Wilks’ Λ = 0.93, partial
η2 = 0.07, 1 −
β = 0.98. Additionally, there was a statistically significant interaction effect between ACEs grouping and student-athlete status on the combined dependent variables,
F(4, 506) = 2.44,
p = 0.046, Wilks’ Λ = 0.96, partial
η2 = 0.02, 1 −
β = 0.70. Interestingly, though, when univariate interaction effects were examined, no significant interactions between ACEs grouping and student-athlete status were observed for depressive symptoms,
F(2, 254) = 2.01,
p = 0.137, partial
η2 = 0.02, or difficulties in emotion regulation,
F(2, 254) = 0.32,
p = 0.730, partial
η2 = 0.00. This lack of an interaction effect indicates that the adverse outcomes associated with increased ACEs exposure occurred at relatively the same rate for student-athletes and non-student-athletes (see
Figure 3 and
Figure 4 for graphical representations).
Follow-up univariate ANOVAs showed that depressive symptoms F(2, 254) = 19.89, p < 0.001, partial η2 = 0.14, and difficulties in emotion regulation F(2, 254) = 11.27, p < 0.001, partial η2 = 0.08 were significantly different between participants of different ACEs groupings. Individuals in the multiple ACEs group reported significantly more depressive symptoms (M = 11.59, SE = 0.79) than individuals in the one ACE (M = 6.85, SE = 0.77, p < 0.001) and no ACEs (M = 5.70, SE = 0.50, p < 0.001) groups. There was no statistically significant difference between the one ACE and no ACEs groups (p = 0.646) as it pertained to endorsement of depressive symptoms. With regard to difficulties in emotion regulation, individuals in the multiple ACEs group (M = 97.68, SE = 2.89) reported significantly greater difficulty in regulating emotions than individuals in the no ACEs group (M = 82.54, SE = 1.82, p < 0.001). Participants in the one ACE group (M = 92.33, SE = 2.82) reported significantly greater difficulty in emotion regulation than participants in the no ACEs group (p = 0.012). There was no statistically significant difference between participants in the multiple ACEs group and the one ACE group with regard to difficulties in emotion regulation (p = 0.559).
Follow-up univariate ANOVAs demonstrated that there was a statistically significant main effect for student-athlete status on endorsement of depressive symptoms, F(1, 254) = 15.53, p < 0.001, partial η2 = 0.06, but not for difficulties in emotion regulation, F(1, 254) = 0.43, p = 0.514, partial η2 = 0.00. Student-athletes reported fewer depressive symptoms (M = 6.45, SE = 0.64) than non-student-athletes (M = 9.64, SE = 0.50, p < 0.001).
A two-way MANCOVA was conducted to follow-up the MANOVA results. There was a total of 259 participants included in this analysis. Results of the two-way MANCOVA demonstrated that there were statistically significant main effects for ACEs groupings on the combined dependent variables after controlling for hardiness, F(4, 502) = 8.98, p < 0.001, Wilks’ Λ = 0.87, partial η2 = 0.07, 1 − β = 0.99, as well as for student-athlete status, F(2, 251) = 7.17, p < 0.001, Wilks’ Λ = 0.95, partial η2 = 0.05, 1 − β = 0.93. The covariate, hardiness, also had a significant association with the combined dependent variables F(2, 251) = 34.57, p < 0.001, Wilks’ Λ = 0.78, partial η2 = 0.22, 1 − β = 1.00. Finally, there was no statistically significant interaction for ACEs grouping and student-athlete status on the combined dependent variables after controlling for hardiness, F(4, 502) = 2.21, p = 0.067, Wilks’ Λ = 0.97, partial η2 = 0.02, 1 − β = 0.65. Collectively, these results indicate that controlling for hardiness did not significantly alter the relationships that were observed between ACEs grouping and student-athlete status with the combined dependent variables in the MANOVA model.
Follow up univariate ANCOVAs were conducted for ACEs grouping. There were statistically significant differences for both depressive symptoms, F(2, 252) = 15.98, p < 0.001, partial η2 = 0.11, and difficulties in emotion regulation, F(2, 252) = 5.78, p = 0.004, partial η2 = 0.04, based on ACEs grouping. Depressive symptoms were significantly greater in the multiple ACEs group (M = 11.12, SE = 0.74) than they were in either the one ACE (M = 6.52, SE = 0.71, p < 0.001) or no ACEs (M = 6.30, SE = 0.47, p < 0.001) groups. There was no significant difference between the one ACE and no ACEs groups (p = 1.000) as it pertained to depressive symptoms. Difficulties in emotion regulation were greater in the multiple ACEs group (M = 95.20, SE = 2.69) than in the no ACEs group (M = 84.83, SE = 1.69, p = 0.004). There was no statistically significant difference in emotion regulation between the multiple ACEs group and the one ACE group (M = 91.05, SE = 2.57, p = 0.793) or the one ACE group and the no ACEs group (p = 0.136). The lack of a significant difference between the one ACE group and the no ACE group with regard to difficulties in emotion regulation represents a difference between the MANOVA and MANCOVA models, as there was a statistically significant difference between these two groups within the MANOVA.
Follow-up univariate ANCOVAs demonstrated that there was a statistically significant main effect for student-athlete status on endorsement of depressive symptoms,
F(1, 252) = 9.53,
p = 0.002, partial
η2 = 0.04, but not for difficulties in emotion regulation,
F(1, 252) = 0.12,
p = 0.727, partial
η2 = 0.00. Student-athletes reported fewer depressive symptoms (
M = 6.82,
SE = 0.59) than non-student-athletes (
M = 9.14,
SE = 0.46,
p = 0.002). The results of the MANOVA, MANCOVA, and follow-up ANOVAs and ANCOVAs have been summarized in
Table 2 and
Table 3.
Finally, an ancillary analysis was conducted following the MANCOVA to investigate potential group differences in hardiness via a two-way ANOVA. Within the ANOVA, ACEs grouping and student-athlete status were entered as the independent variables, and hardiness was entered as the dependent variable. Prior to interpreting the results of the ANOVA, assumptions for univariate analysis were checked given the new dependent variable of hardiness. The data was found to be normally distributed, free of outliers, and to have homogeneity of variances, thus meeting the assumptions for univariate analysis. There were 264 participants included in this analysis. Results of the ANOVA indicated a significant main effect for both ACEs grouping, F(2, 258) = 6.44, p = 0.002, partial η2 = 0.05, and student-athlete status, F(1, 258) = 5.47, p = 0.020, partial η2 = 0.02. There was not a statistically significant interaction between ACEs grouping and student-athlete status, F(2, 258) = 1.70, p = 0.184, partial η2 = 0.01. Participants in the multiple ACEs grouping scored significantly lower on hardiness (M = 27.50, SE = 0.73) than individuals in the no ACEs group (M = 30.23, SE = 0.45, p = 0.005). Individuals in the one ACE group (M = 28.14, SE = 0.71) also scored significantly lower on hardiness than individuals in the no ACEs group (p = 0.042). There were no significant differences between the multiple ACEs and one ACE groups (p = 1.000). Student-athletes scored significantly higher on hardiness (M = 29.49, SE = 0.59) than non-student-athletes (M = 27.76, SE = 0.46, p = 0.020).
4. Discussion
The primary purpose of the current study was to compare depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation in college student-athletes versus non-student-athletes, while accounting for the number of ACEs participants experienced. Our first hypothesis was correct, and there was a significant main effect for the number of ACEs participants endorsed. Individuals who endorsed multiple ACEs reported significantly greater depressive symptoms than individuals who endorsed only one ACE or no ACEs. Participants in the multiple ACEs and the one ACE group also reported significantly greater difficulty in emotion regulation than participants in the no ACEs grouping. These results align with the general trend that has been observed for both athletes and non-athletes, which is, the more ACEs one is exposed to in childhood, the more likely they are to experience negative mental health outcomes in adulthood [
1,
13,
21]. Our second hypothesis was partially supported by the data. Student-athletes reported significantly fewer depressive symptoms than non-student-athletes, but there was not a significant difference between these two groups when examining differences in difficulties in emotion regulation. Again, this result aligns with prior research indicating that student-athletes generally demonstrate lower levels of depression than non-student-athletes [
14], possibly due to the myriad of ways in which athletics may promote mental health during development (e.g., increased social supports, regular exercise, etc.).
Our third hypothesis was not supported by the data. Within the MANOVA, there was a significant interaction effect between the number of ACEs participants endorsed and student-athlete status for the combined dependent variables; however, when follow-up univariate ANOVAs were examined, there were no statistically significant interaction effects between ACEs grouping and student-athlete status on either dependent variable. Increased exposure to ACEs did not have a differential effect on mental health when examining non-student-athlete mental health compared to student-athlete mental health. Therefore, the increased depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation that were associated with increased ACEs occurred at relatively the same rate, regardless of student-athlete status. As alluded to earlier, athletic involvement may decrease the allostatic load associated with ACEs and promote mental health due to the opportunity for regular exercise [
21] and facilitation of other positive psychosocial developments (e.g., increased social support, positive mentors through coaching, promotion of hardy attitudes, etc.), but this may come at a cost when competing at higher levels of sport. In particular, college student-athletes may face stressors such as overtraining [
48], burnout [
49], high demands on time [
50], help-seeking stigma [
51], injuries [
30], and social media pressure and criticism [
52] that their non-student-athlete peers do not. These stressors may counteract the positive benefits of athletic involvement on mental health and, thus, not significantly alter the relationship between ACEs and psychological outcomes.
Our fourth and final hypothesis was also not supported by the data. When hardiness was controlled for, there were still main effects observed for ACEs grouping and student-athlete status on the combined dependent variables, and there was not a statistically significant interaction effect. Differences in depressive symptoms based on ACEs grouping and student-athlete status remained the same as they did in the MANOVA model. However, some slight group differences were observed in the MANCOVA model when comparing differences in difficulties in emotion regulation. There was no longer a significant difference in difficulties in emotion regulation between participants in the one ACE and no ACEs groups once hardiness was controlled for. Ancillary analyses indicated that individuals who reported no ACEs scored higher on hardiness than individuals with one or multiple ACEs, and student-athletes scored higher on hardiness than non-student-athletes. Collectively, despite small group differences, the overall relationships between ACEs and student-athlete status with depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation were not significantly altered by controlling for hardiness. Therefore, while student-athletes, on average, endorsed higher levels of hardy attitudes, the trait of hardiness alone was not enough to account for the differences in mental health observed between student-athletes and non-student-athletes. Student-athletes may have reported fewer depressive symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation for a number of reasons beyond simply possessing hardy attitudes, which will be considered in the following section.
4.1. Implications
Results of the current study underscore the importance of sport involvement for those working with youth (e.g., teachers, coaches, etc.). Student-athletes appeared less likely to experience ACEs growing up, which may have contributed to them being less likely to experience depressive symptoms than non-student-athletes. Further, sport involvement may have provided exercise regimens [
21] and consistent social support [
53] that could have decreased allostatic load even when exposed to ACEs, possibly contributing to a buffering effect. Time spent in sporting activities in childhood (e.g., practices, games, etc.) that are necessary to achieve a high level of sport involvement (i.e., collegiate sport) later in life may be likely to lead to time spent away from a negative home environment or situations, possibly decreasing the chance of experiencing ACEs and/or the time exposed to the negative repercussions of ACEs (e.g., family conflict; [
21]). This time spent away from potentially negative environments to engage in resilience-promoting activities (e.g., sport, exercise, peer connections) may be beneficial to children’s mental health as they age into adulthood, even if they do experience some ACEs. Thus, it appears that athletic involvement by and large can be beneficial to mental health throughout development and may even buffer against some of the negative mental health outcomes associated with ACEs in adulthood.
Similar to Skirka [
33], we also found student-athletes to score higher on hardiness than non-student-athletes. Thus, sport involvement over time may have led to the internalization of hardy attitudes (e.g., being highly committed to goal-directed behavior, seeing challenges as opportunities for growth, etc.). However, student-athletes were also less likely to experience ACEs than non-student-athletes (see
Figure 1), which may have contributed to them being more likely to internalize hardy attitudes because participants with no ACEs, on average, reported greater hardiness than those with one ACE and/or multiple ACEs. Thus, it may be that sport involvement promoted hardy attitudes in student-athletes, but they may have already been more likely to develop hardy attitudes due to being less likely to experience ACEs. For individuals who reported no ACEs, it may be that there was a stronger belief in having control over events in their life due to not having as many experiences with negative events that were out of their control (e.g., maltreatment from a parent while growing up). Nevertheless, given the potential for the buffering effect athletics seems to provide to ACEs as well as the increased likelihood for developing hardy attitudes, professionals involved in working with youth (e.g., teachers, coaches, counselors) may want to consider encouraging athletic involvement for the multiple pathways it provides to promoting mental health and resilience.
4.2. Study Limitations
The present study is not without limitations. First, the study was a small sample from one university in the Midwest U.S., which may hinder the generalizability of the results. A larger sample size could have also allowed for grouping participants into traditional ACEs categorizations (i.e., 0, 1, 2, 3, and 4+; [
1]), increasing our knowledge of ACEs’ impact on student-athletes relative to non-student-athletes in the manner researchers typically contextualize ACEs and their relationship with adult health outcomes. Additionally, only a small subset of student-athletes reported experiencing one or more ACEs, which may have impacted our ability to make comparisons between groups of individuals who have experienced ACEs. Second, we utilized a cross-sectional design, so drawing conclusions about the data is difficult. For example, it is unclear whether athletic involvement facilitated the development of hardy attitudes for participants in this study or if individuals with hardy attitudes were already more likely to self-select into staying involved with sports throughout their youth and into college. Further, it is hard to ascertain how other aspects of sport involvement (e.g., regular physical activity) impacted allostatic load for those student-athletes and non-student-athletes that experienced ACEs throughout their development. Adding to this, we only know whether or not our participants were playing sports in college, but it may be possible that some participants were active in sports for most of their lives but ceased playing once they entered their college years (thus, they may have only been out of sports for a short period of time). Third, the number of variables we collected was limited regarding the scope of mental health concerns we assessed (i.e., depressive symptoms and emotion regulation difficulties). Research collecting a more robust assessment of mental health (e.g., inclusion of anxiety measures, substance use measures, etc.) may provide greater insight into the adult psychological outcomes associated with ACEs and athletic involvement between student-athletes and non-student-athletes. Lastly, since data collection was performed for separate studies, the data collected for this study was obtained through two different sampling methods. Namely, one set of data was collected through an Introduction to Psychology research pool, wherein participants completed measures for course credit. The other set of data was collected through paying participants
$5.00 for their involvement in the study. Therefore, it is unclear if these alternate forms of incentives may have differentially impacted participants’ responses and/or response style. For example, student-athletes who elected to participate via email recruitment may have been more willing to participate if they had not experienced a high degree of childhood adversity as opposed to those who completed the survey for course credit, resulting in a self-selection bias.
4.3. Directions for Future Research
Directions for future research may build off the limitations of this study. Research using a larger sample size involving participants from multiple universities across a wide geographic region may enhance the external validity of results. Further, a larger sample size may provide researchers the ability to create comparison groups based off the traditional ACEs groupings (i.e., 0, 1, 2, 3, and/or 4+ ACEs; [
1,
4]), which would provide a more comprehensive understanding of how ACEs impact student-athletes and non-student-athletes. Unfortunately, due to our sample size, we were not able to create groups of adequate size to do comparisons in this manner. To add to the generalizability of results, a longitudinal approach that collects many mental health variables and tracks participants from childhood to adulthood would provide a more nuanced understanding of how ACEs and athletic involvement relate to mental health across the lifespan, especially if that data is collected in the same manner for all participants to reduce bias of differing sampling methods. Finally, future researchers are encouraged to add validity checks when conducting online data collection [
54]. Such checks may enhance the trustworthiness of results.