2009 – Retirement from athletics – Dissertation

Description

This critical inquiry examines the literature on retirement from sport using a gerontological framework. Review of the literature reveals that thanatological perspectives and gerontological theories such as disengagement, activity, continuity, and social breakdown, provided an early conceptual basis for understanding retirement from sport. However, these perspectives fell out of favor because of their inability to be generalized to the unique trajectories of athletes who retire much younger than the general population. Moving forward, scholars incorporated traditional transition models while focusing on athletic identity development to better understand retirement outcomes experienced by athletes. Because of the relationship between athletic identity development and life course development, the Life Course Capital model is introduced as an alternative framework to understand the mechanisms for withdrawal from sport and how athletes can rely on acquired capital to adjust accordingly.