While browsing WIWMTK, you may have wondered how exactly the “dumb jock” stereotype is related to disabilities. In a series of blog posts, I will answer that exact question in detail, but for a brief explanation:
There is a prominent narrative surrounding student-athletes in which they are viewed as less capable academically (or better known as the "dumb jock"). However, playing sports puts student-athletes at risk of sustaining concussions. Despite their prevalence, concussions are difficult to diagnose and it is not uncommon for them to go undiagnosed. Sustaining traumatic brain injuries can lead to various disabilities such as with cognition or communication. However, due to the dumb jock stereotype (i.e., the belief that student-athletes are less capable in terms of intellect and motivation) teachers may ignore the signs of concussion-related disabilities. Rather than recognizing that a student may be having difficulty in class for outside reasons, confirmation bias could cause teachers to see a cognitively impaired student-athlete struggling to concentrate and, without knowing there is an undiagnosed concussion, reinforce their own stereotypical notion of the dumb jock. This is because, if instructors continue to subscribe to the idea that student-athletes are disinterested or less capable than their peers, they will ignore the signs of concussion-related disabilities such as difficulty with memory and concentration and instead use such instances as reinforcement of their existing belief in the dumb jock.
This is the second post of a three-part series detailing the implications of the dumb jock stereotype, the elusive nature of concussions, and how confirmation bias can prevent student-athletes from receiving the proper treatment they need. If you haven’t already, go here to read The Origins and Development of The "Dumb Jock" to gain insight into the beginnings of the dumb jock stereotype and how it unfolds today. In this post, we will discuss mild traumatic brain injuries, better known as concussions.
The Prevalence of Concussions
There has been much fervor surrounding concussions recently as with the discussions about CTE, a degenerative brain disease that can occur after repeated concussions or just the elusive nature of concussions in general. With the growing notoriety of concussions given their connection to the long-term health issues of professional football players, much emphasis has been made on concussion prevalence in all sports, as the high number of concussions in football players could be because football has the most participants annually and many sports (such as soccer and basketball) follow closely behind in the rate of mild TBI incidence. Concussions, which were once known as a “hidden injury” continue to impact over 1 million people in America each year.4 Between 2009 and 2014, laws were passed nationally in order to prevent concussions by educating young athletes.5
Difficult to Diagnose
While these laws resulted in greater reporting of concussions as well as fewer undiagnosed concussions, it is still estimated that of the number of concussions that are diagnosed each year, roughly the same amount go undiagnosed.8 This leads to another major component about concussions, which is the difficulty there is to diagnose them. There is no single test for concussion thus, of the roughly 67,000 concussions of high school football players, it is estimated the same number of concussions are undiagnosed.8 A 2014 study conducted to test the claim that half of all concussions go undiagnosed found that roughly one-third of the patients studied had sustained a concussion that went undiagnosed.6 It should be noted that this rate of undiagnosed concussions is somewhat lower than that of previous research.6 This could be attributed to the growing awareness about concussions given that this study was published in 2014, at the end of the period in which states across the US were passing laws to educate young athletes about concussions.6 Even with the difficulty to diagnose a concussion, there are other factors at play that mean even diagnosed concussions don’t receive the proper treatment, or that inhibit people from seeking a diagnosis in the first place.
“[M]y treatment meant that I was supposed to sit in a dark room for at least a week without doing school work . . . However, I felt so pressured to keep up that I refused to sit around and do nothing all day. I would work on my laptop for spurts of time until the headache got too bad.” - An Anonymous UMD Student-Athlete.1
“You are supposed to be tough. You are supposed to play through pain. You are not supposed to cry. We are taught that early on in the game as kids. Tough sport. Brutal sport. It’s like the gladiator. People want to see the big hits. They wind up on Sports Center. And as a player, you don’t want to admit you are injured.” - Eric Dickerson, Hall of Fame running back.7
The Significance of Undiagnosed Concussions
In 2018, a qualitative study was conducted to understand the lived experiences of adults who had sustained a concussion as athletes in college.2 The researchers of this study provided context for what their objective was in the study as well as how they developed the questions they would ask participants. This context includes the under-diagnosis of concussions as well as the implications of that: persistent negative effects on “physical, emotional, social or cognitive functioning or a combination of these,”.2 They found that the respondents who had sustained a concussion in their youth experienced various symptoms that impacted their functioning in the aforementioned categories.2 Researchers also reported these participants struggled to reintegrate back into an academic environment following their concussion.2 (The impact of concussions in an academic setting will be discussed more extensively in the final part of this three-part series of blog posts).
For many people, concussions resolve in a few weeks with proper treatment but this is not always the case.3 There is also the chance of developing Post-Concussion Syndrome (PCS) which causes somatic, cognitive, and behavioral impairments much like those outlined in the study on collegiate athletes.3 However, PCS is much more long-lasting, impacting the lives of children and adults alike for months or even years.3 Symptoms of PCS typically begin as physical deficits such as fatigue and headaches and are followed by psychosocial symptoms like depression.3 Neuropsychological and cognitive deficits such as subjective concentration and impaired memory also appear over time.3 These physical and cognitive impairments affect the lives of people with PCS completely, harming personal relationships, impacting the development of children by keeping them out of class, and increasing strain on adults with the condition financially and socially by keeping them out of work.3
“For some people, one concussion is enough—they are slow to recover and they should give up the sport. But most athletes recover in 7 to 10 days.” - Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), Co-founder of the Concussion Legacy Foundation.7
In sum, concussions are increasingly prevalent today. This could be the result of greater reporting and diagnosis of concussions, but the fact remains, 1.3 million Americans sustain a concussion each year.4 Not only that, but it is estimated that the same amount of concussions that are diagnosed each year go undiagnosed.8 There is no single test for a concussion and they are still largely misunderstood which explains why so many go undiagnosed.8 Other factors like the need to continue playing a sport or the fear of falling behind in school can prevent people from following treatment plans when they are diagnosed with concussions or prevent people from seeking a diagnosis in the first place. This is detrimental as concussions left untreated can lead to various disabilities such as with cognition or communication that last for months or longer.3 It is these concussion related disabilities that led me to creating Not A Dumb Jock for What I Wish My Teacher Knew About My Disability. In the final post in this series, the connection between undiagnosed concussions and the dumb jock stereotype will be made. In addition, I will elucidate how teachers identifying the symptoms of a concussion can help students receive the proper treatment needed to reverse some of these long-lasting deficits. Part 3 can be found here.
Works Cited
1 Anonymous Interviewee 1, Personal Interview. 15 October, 2020.
2 Cover, Rebecca, et al. “The Lived Experiences of Retired Collegiate Athletes With a History of 1 or More Concussions.” Journal of Athletic Training (Allen Press), vol. 53, no. 7, July 2018, pp. 646–656. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=s3h&AN=131692456&site=ehost-live.
3 Daneshvar, Daniel H et al. “Long-term consequences: effects on normal development profile after concussion.” Physical medicine and rehabilitation clinics of North America vol. 22,4 (2011): 683-700, ix. doi:10.1016/j.pmr.2011.08.009
4 Daneshvar, Daniel H et al. “The epidemiology of sport-related concussion.” Clinics in sports medicine vol. 30,1 (2011): 1-17, vii. doi:10.1016/j.csm.2010.08.006
5 Guskiewicz, Kevin M., and Samuel R. Walton. “The Changing Landscape of Sport Concussion.” Kinesiology Review, vol. 9, no. 1, Feb. 2020, pp. 79–85. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=s3h&AN=141883764&site=ehost-live.
6 Meehan, William P 3rd et al. “The prevalence of undiagnosed concussions in athletes.” Clinical journal of sport medicine : official journal of the Canadian Academy of Sport Medicine vol. 23,5 (2013): 339-42. doi:10.1097/JSM.0b013e318291d3b3
7 Phillips, Stone. “Quotes from Players and Experts.” Stone Phillips Reports, Jan. 2012, stonephillipsreports.com/2012/01/quotes-from-players-and-experts/.
8 Talavage, Thomas M et al. “Functionally-detected cognitive impairment in high school football players without clinically-diagnosed concussion.” Journal of Neurotrauma vol. 31,4 (2014): 327-38. doi:10.1089/neu.2010.1512