Interdisciplinary research and youth sport injury: developing methodological insights

Recognising sport injuries as complex phenomena has urged calls for alternative research approaches to better understand their causes. Instead of adhering to traditional research approaches only, scholars advocate for a methodological pluralism, incorporating both qualitative and quantitative methods and integrating knowledge from different disciplines. Such integrated approaches offer a more comprehensive understanding of sport injuries by addressing their multifaceted and intricate nature. While integrated research approaches in sport science are gaining momentum, their focus has primarily centred on adult athlete health. However, given the prevalence of youth sport injuries and their significant consequences, it is necessary to develop effective approaches for studying them. Moreover, there is a lack of best practices for how to integrate methods and knowledge from different disciplines in youth sport injury research. Addressing these gaps is crucial for informing comprehensive injury prevention interventions. The overall aim of this thesis is to explore and explain the methodological insights that can be gained from conducting interdisciplinary youth sport injury research. Three research questions guide the thesis: 1) What is the base of existing disciplinary knowledge on youth sport injuries and how does this knowledge shape the understanding of youth sport injuries? 2) What contextual and methodological issues are important to consider in interdisciplinary youth sport injury research? 3) How can qualitative and quantitative youth sport injury data be integrated in an interdisciplinary research process? The thesis incorporates four journal papers and presents these in the following framework text embedding the conducted research papers into a broader theoretical perspective. The four central papers are: a research protocol paper, a narrative review of literature, a paper describing the adaption and application of a questionnaire to youth football players, and a methodological paper focusing on the integration of qualitative and quantitative youth sport injury data as part of an interdisciplinary research process. All of these papers were developed within the interdisciplinary research project ‘Injury-free children and adolescents: Towards better practice in Swedish football (FIT project)’. The thesis has generated three broad insights that correspond to the research questions. First, existing knowledge on youth sport injuries stems from several fields, including biomedicine, sport psychology and sport sociology, underscoring the complex and interdisciplinary nature of youth sport injuries. Second, contextual factors significantly impact youth sport injuries, making it necessary for future researchers to account for these influences when developing research tools and addressing ethical concerns during the interdisciplinary research process. Third, integration of qualitative and quantitative youth sport injury data is facilitated through a three-stage procedure that enables common ground, a comparison of different types of data, and dialogue across disciplinary boundaries. Overall, the thesis showcases three vital components crucial to interdisciplinary research: Synthesisation, contextualisation, and integration. The thesis also highlights the need for further exploration of interdisciplinary practices’ possibilities and limitations related to integration and their application in developing complex injury prevention interventions.