• Sport from the Perspective of Peer Groups
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Sport from the Perspective of Peer Groups

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This book explores how communitisation emerges within adolescent peer groups and how it influences their engagement in physical education.
  • 13 April 2026
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Peer groups gain particular significance during the transition from childhood to adolescence, as young people increasingly orient themselves towards their friends. Sport provides an exemplary field in which both the importance of peer groups and the possibilities for researching them become visible. This book explores how communitisation emerges within adolescent peer groups and how it influences their engagement in physical education, club- and informal sport. Guided by three central questions, it reconstructs: (1) the collective orientations that structure sporting practices; (2) the conjunctive spaces of experience in which these practices are embedded; and (3) the alignments between orientations and spaces of experience. Based on a longitudinal study using group discussions with diverse peer groups, the analysis shows that peer groups are social collectives characterised by shared stocks of knowledge. By focusing on the collective dimension of sport, the book addresses a significant research gap in sport pedagogy and provides a foundation for interdisciplinary research spanning sport pedagogy, sociology and psychology.
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Price: $55.00
Pages: 146
Publisher: Verlag Barbara Budrich
Imprint: Verlag Barbara Budrich
Publication Date: 13 April 2026
Trim Size: 8.27 X 5.83 in
ISBN: 9783847434146
Format: Paperback
BISACs: EDUCATION / Non-Formal Education
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Prof. Dr. Benjamin Zander is a full professor of Sport Science and Head of the Sport and Society Division at the Institute of Physical Education and Sport Sciences at Osnabrück University, Germany.

Acknowledgements
Summary
1 Introduction
2 Theoretical and Methodological Foundations
2.1 Theoretical Framework: How to Theoretically Conceptualise Peer Groups as a Research Topic
2.1.1 Conceptualising the Term ‘Peer Group’: Everyday and Academic Perspectives
2.1.2 Conceptualising the Peer Group as a Multidimensional Collective
2.2 Methodological Approach: How to Empirically Investigate the Collectively Shared Perspectives of Peer Groups
2.2.1 Group Discussion Method for Data Collection
2.2.2 Documentary Method for Data Analysis
3 Results: Collective Orientations, Spaces of Experience and Their Alignments
3.1 Collective Orientations of Peer Groups
3.1.1 The Group in Focus: Variants of Peer Groups
3.1.2 Five Orientations of Practice within Peer Groups
3.1.3 Interim Conclusion and Implications for Sport Pedagogy
3.2 Conjunctive Spaces of Experience in School and Leisure
3.2.1 Conjunctive Spaces of Experience in School and PE
3.2.2 Conjunctive Spaces of Experience in Leisure and Recreational Sport
3.2.3 Interim Conclusion and Implications for Sport Pedagogy
3.3 Unequal Alignments of collective Orientations and conjunctive Spaces of Experience
3.3.1 Socio-educational, Milieu-specific Alignments
3.3.2 Age-specific Alignments
3.3.3 Gender-specific Alignments
3.3.4 Interim Conclusion and Implications for Sport Pedagogy
4 Conclusion and Outlook: Sport-pedagogical Contributions to Peer Group Research in School and Leisure
4.1 Conclusion on Peer Group Research
4.2 Outlook on Themes for Collective-centred Peer Group Research
5 References
6 Index