Abstract

Trust in the reliance or resting of the mind on the integrity, justice and friendship of another person. The willingness to trust other people is a desireable trait for harmonious existance in our society and a necessity for participation in physical activity and competitive athletics. The development of trust has always been an objective of physical educators and coaches in the difficult to measure affective domain. It was the purpose of this study to investigate the development of trust in children relative to age, sex and participation in organized age group athletics. One hundred and twenty boys (N=60) and girls N=60), eight (N=20), ten (N=20), and twelve (N=20) years of age served as subjects. Each subject was tested in the <trust fall>, the first known use of this behavioral test for research purposes. The task required each subjects to stand on a release board located on an adjustable platform at shoulder height, place his/her arms across their chest, close their eyes and all backward (keeping their body stiff) into the arms of six of their peers. A chronometric device was constructed to time the delay between a subject receiving the test instructions and command <go> from an audio tape, and the initiation of the fall from the release board. Elapsed time was measured to the nearest one hundred of a second. Computation of a three (age) by two (sex) by two (participation) ANOVA resulted in the findings that males were more trusting than females and participants were more trusting than non-participants (p<.05). An orthogonal polynominal analysis of the age effect indicated that ninety-five percent of the variability in trust, brought about by increasing age from eight to twelve, could be predicted by a linear regression equation. Verf.-Referat