Football, growth spurts and the brain

Teenagers can be notoriously difficult. Less dependent on their family and with a growing affinity to their friends, it is a period defined by many types of change. This is no different for teenagers who play football.

Many football coaches appreciate that adolescence is a difficult period, one characterised by physical growth spurts. But other than the vague recognition that ‘change’ is occurring, how much do coaches really know about young players’ experience during this period? And, most importantly, how should coaching approaches change as result?

Research into the makeup of the teenage brain reduces this complex arena to two systems: one cognitive, one emotional. Notably, the two systems do not develop at the same rate. During the teenage period the brain experiences developmental ‘re-organisation’, affecting how adolescents think, feel and behave.

Such change has a significant effect on an adolescent’s abilities. Controlling thoughts and emotions, planning, focusing attention, making decisions, monitoring one’s own thoughts and having an awareness of others intentions are all impacted upon. These ‘higher order’ functions are some of the last regions of the brain to develop and may not fully mature until well into the third decade of life.

In light of these findings, coaches shouldn’t be surprised to encounter teenage players who display erratic traits and poor decision-making, both on and off the pitch. It is worth giving consideration to the number of talented teenage players who have been discarded from football clubs, when greater understanding and patience may have helped them negotiate this difficult developmental period.

During adolescence the emotional system undergoes rapid development, developing earlier than the cognitive control system. These changes are often associated with impulsive behaviour such as risky or reactive decision-making. During this time there seems to be an imbalance or ‘emotional overshoot’ in which teenagers tend to see both more reward and less danger in situations than adults. This is attributed to a developmental imbalance between emotional and cognitive regions and the connections between them.

In adulthood and childhood the two systems appear balanced (in childhood the two systems are both immature, thus not imbalanced), whereas during adolescence, the emotional system develops earlier and is speculated to have a stronger influence than the cognitive system, especially the control in an aroused or motivated environment.

Research speculates that in aroused contexts, such as competitive football matches, teenage behaviour might be characterised by strong reactions to emotionally charged cues with a reduced ability to control these instincts. This has potential implications, in terms of emotion, for the types of practice and environment created by coaches and parents including, for example, the type of language and feedback used, the degree of emphasis on results and whether there exists a culture of ‘fear of making mistakes’.

Such findings should prompt coaches to consider the appropriateness of their method and approach. Coaches can grow frustrated when practices or instructions are misunderstood by young players. There may, however, be a disparity between the coach’s expectation and a player’s capability. Take the idea of asking players to ‘paint pictures’ – which in essence requires young players to recognise patterns of play in which various options may present themselves. Research suggests that the ability to create abstract mental images about possible scenarios is a skill which develops with age. This ability is not yet consistently developed in the adolescent player and improves with both maturation and experience.

Recent brain research suggests that teenagers may not have the ability to think counter-factually such as in ‘what if’ scenarios. In potentially uncertain or risky situations, teenagers process information differently to adults. Adults use a quicker process that uses intuitive and automatic areas of the brain, generating pictures of the scenario in their mind’s eye. Teenagers on the other hand tend not to recruit visual representations and tend to spend longer working it out. In comparison to adults, teenagers do not activate the ‘visual system’. The upshot is that while adults can more easily create an image of a possible scenario automatically with little effort, teenagers may not generate such gut feelings and take longer figuring out the available options.

So, again, it must be asked: what does this mean for football? The research suggests that on the football pitch teenagers may be thinking and making decisions in a qualitatively different way than adult players. They may find it harder to generate pictures in their mind and take longer weighing up situations or rush situations ‘without thinking’.

Implications for coaches

The cognitive and emotional systems

• An awareness of why teenagers’ responses in aroused situations may seem over emotional. In competitive football these may manifest themselves as an over- reaction to; refereeing decisions, managers decisions, teammates behaviour. On the pitch there may be periods of impulsive, reactive ‘not thought out’ play such as forcing play, panicky decision-making and risky decision-making.
• An awareness that this phase, similar to physical growth spurts, may be linked to a developmental phase. Patience should be shown, as impulsive behaviours may be examples of a ‘reactive period’ that may develop with both coaching and maturation.
• Important decisions are taken during adolescence including whether full-time contracts are awarded at 16/17 years of age. Patience should be shown with players whose weaknesses involve poor decision-making. This may develop with a little more time and coaching input, as it is speculated that the brain areas associated with decision-making may not be fully developed until well into the early/mid-twenties.
• A case could be made for keeping more players attached to clubs until their early twenties – perhaps on less expensive ‘developmental’ contracts.

‘Painting pictures’

• Coaches need to be mindful that just talking about scenarios/pictures is not enough for young players. Teenagers’ ability to create abstract thought or pictures of possible consequences are possibly not fully developed until early adulthood.
• Coaches should not assume that younger players can recreate pictures in their minds consistently without guidance; and that these processes need scaffolding with regular verbal, visual and kinaesthetic input. Although teenagers may show some understanding on occasions this is not a yet a permanent ability and needs to be revisited on a regular basis.
• Coaches need to have an awareness that players may be at different stages of mental development (similar to physical differences) and shouldn’t assume that they can all think like adults. Although some young players appear physically mature, their brains and minds are still in the process of developing and may not be fully developed until well into their mid-twenties (Blakemore and Frith, 2005).

Perry Walters is an academy coach at Bristol City and researcher at Bristol University.

This article was first published in The Boot Room magazine in August 2012.