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Key points
- Calm and composed parents and coaches keep young athletes properly focused at their sporting events.
- Angry adults screaming and yelling will ignite distracting anxiety and stress for young athletes.
- "Calm is contagious," a U.S. Navy SEALs mantra, is a biologically-based phenomenon called co-regulation.
“Calm is contagious.”
That wisdom from the United States Navy SEALs.
It’s also sound advice for anyone involved with young people, including coaches, teachers, and parents, especially when it comes to youth sports.
If it’s good enough for the Navy SEALs, it’s good enough for youth coaches and parents.
Anxiety Is Also Contagious
Keep that in mind the next time you get the urge to scream or pitch a fit at a youth sporting event.
Competitive sports are stressful enough for any athlete, especially young participants. Angry outbursts from coaches and parents—particularly after a kid makes a mistake—fuel distracting stress and anxiety for young athletes. It’s like pouring gasoline on a fire.
Composure is a crucial ingredient of successful performance. Coaches and parents throwing temper tantrums disrupt young athletes’ focus, serve as poor role models, and embarrass both themselves and their kids.
“The overall purpose of a leader is helping the group improve,” behavioral psychologist Joe Dagen, Ph.D., explained to me. “It doesn’t matter if it’s with a hazardous industry or in athletics, [leaders] are there to achieve some outcome and to help the team achieve that.”
Dagen researches and trains leaders involved in hazardous environments where life and death hang in the balance, including the military, aviation, and aerospace industries. He has designed and managed leadership development programs for tens of thousands of such leaders.
People in stressful environments want leaders that exude composure, humility, and confidence, according to Dagen, especially in times of turmoil (including sports). Effective leadership exudes calm, humility, and confidence, qualities absorbed by people around them in stressful circumstances.
“In hazardous operations, if a leader creates an environment that’s punitive—lots of yelling, lots of that type of environment—the quality of work is sacrificed,” explained Dagen. While youth athletics usually do not qualify as a “hazardous operation,” angry, screaming adults transform it into that by creating a toxic, pressure-packed “punitive environment.”
It’s Biology
“Calm is contagious” is a biological phenomenon called “co-regulation.” Without getting caught up in the scientific specifics, suffice it to say that we emotionally mirror each other. Calm, composed people keep other people calm and composed. Conversely, angry, screaming adults make for anxious, stressed kids.
How does an airline pilot speak over the intercom during a turbulent flight? Slowly and calmly. The aviation industry—both commercial and military—call it the “Yeager Voice” in honor of Chuck Yeager, a World War II fighter aviator and famed test pilot who was the first to officially break the sound barrier. He was known for his calm composure under stressful circumstances as both a pilot and military officer.
“Anxiety is contagious” is also co-regulation. Exposure to angry screaming and demeanor causes activation of the nervous system and its release of cortisol and adrenaline, a chemical cocktail producing anxiety. Gasoline on a young athlete’s already smoldering stress.
Take It From an NFL Coach
“I don’t get yelling and screaming at players,” said retired veteran NFL coach Sherman Smith. “What’s the goal? Are you trying to improve them, or just trying to let ‘em know how mad you are?” According to Smith, he never yelled at any of the Seattle Seahawk, Houston Oiler, Tennessee Titan, or Washington Redskin players he coached.
Sage wisdom from Smith, a retired NFL coach with 23 years of coaching experience, a stint that includes three Super Bowl appearances. He also enjoyed a productive eight-year NFL playing career as a wide receiver.
Here’s an accomplished NFL coach who didn’t yell at professional football players. Yet, go to any youth sporting event and you’re sure to witness coaches and parents yelling and screaming at young kids.
Please take note, youth sports coaches and parents. Chill out and keep your young athletes calm, composed, and focused.
