Sports Participation Rates Estimates

Given the amount of time and energy I've been putting into sports, I felt I needed a clear idea regarding what percent of the various age/gender groups in the US population, have a serious interest in the various sports. I wanted to know, what percent of the age/gender group had an interest in at least one of seven sports I've recently been participating in.

I realized, that I had to process the stats which give how many people participate in a sport, to account for the fact that the total of this stat for all the sports, is 4.1 times larger than the population of active-athletes. This because many people participate in more than one sport. The 4.1 figure indicates that on average the physically active participate in 4 different sports. I wanted to process out, if the participant figures for seven different sports add up to 165 million, then what percent of the population is involved in at least one of those sports?

The number of persons at the gym had begun to seem small to me, the people at the gym, had begun to seem suspiciously un-typical. I was wondering: am I being deceived by all the media hoopla about sports?; could it be, that the actual truth, is that there is a small minority of individuals who each engage in lots of sports, thereby making it seem as if sports is more popular than it actually is?; could it be, that most of the people involved in sports are children and that the normal adult ignores sports?

I started out building a table that (as of now) gives the Participation rates in absolute and percent terms, for seven different sports, for several different age/gender groups. This required combining incomplete information available from the National Sporting Goods Association (the leading source of such info), with Census Data and the art of math:

Sports Participation & Fandom Rates for Various age/gender Groups

The next problem, was figuring out what percent of the 'active' persons, are what I would call 'seriously' active in their sport, active enough to take an interest in literature and coaching in the sport.

In the 2013 PAC Overview Report, I noted on page 8, the  '2012 level of activity':

Active to a Healthy Level and Beyond (151+ times/yr) High Calorie Activity: 32.9%.

Active (51~150 times) High Calorie Activity: 11.2%.

Casual (1~50 times) High Calorie Activity 9.3%.

Low to Medium calorie activities: 18.6%.

None 28.0%.

According to the NSGA's definition, someone is active in a sport if he participates in it more than once a year. Based on these above PAC stats, I concluded that 80% of those who the NSGA rates as active in a sport, have a serious interest in the sport.

The next problem, was, how can I estimate the participation rate for an age-group, if the only stats available are the participation rate in the population at large?

In the 2013 PAC Overview Report , I noted on page 7, the  'Inactivity Levels (by age-group)'. On this basis I estimated that:

Given that ps = the percent of the age 6+ population involved in sports, the percent that is involved in sports age 6-17 would be 1.12(ps); the percent age 18-54 involved in sports would be 1.02(ps), the percent age 55-64 involved in sports would be 0.9(ps), and the percent age 65+ involved in exercise/sports would be 0.85(ps).

I decided to apply these statistical adjustments to each sport on a uniform basis, in determining my estimate for the percent of an age/gender group involved in a given sport. So for example, given that the (extrapolated from NSGA data) reported rate of participation for males 6 years old and older in running was 15%, I estimated that the participation rate for males age 6-17 was 1.12(15%)= 16.8% (this aside from the separate issue of 80% of the active being 'seriously active'.

Combining the adjustment for seriousness of activity, the adjustment for age-groups, and the info I had for percent of population 6+ active in a sport, I came up with estimates for what percent of a gender/age-group is seriously active in a sport:

My Estimates (actual data lacking) of Percent of Persons with Serious Participatory Interest in Certain Sports, and in one of a Group of Sports, for Age/Gender Groups, 2012

The final problem of the evening, was: so I know how many people are involved in running, how many are involved in swimming, how many in weightlifting, how many in basketball, how many in soccer, how many in tennis. From this information, how can I estimate, how many are involved in at least one of the seven sports?

I had the following info: the total of the NSGA participation figures (age 7+) for the 7 sports came to 165 million; the total of the participation stats for all the 45 or so sports tabulated by the NSGA came to (age 7+) 823 million; the total of active persons (age 6+) according to the PAC was 199 million; 823/199 = 4.1; a sports participant by definition participates in at least one sport. I came up with the following formula and math:

165.3/823=0.20.

4.1-1.0=3.1.

0.20 x 3.1 = 0.62.

1+0.62 = 1.62.

Hence I concluded that the total of the various number of participants figures for the 7 sports I was focusing on, should be divided by 1.6, to get an estimate of how many different individual persons participated in at least one of the 7 sports (because some participate in more than one sport).

There are various advantages to making estimates: you have something to work with when data is nonexistent or unavailable; you learn how to make estimates in situations where data is nonexistent or unavailable; you have something to work with if you feel like checking the veracity of some statistic.