Abstract
The International Standard for Education (ISE) mandates Code Signatories to plan, deliver, and evaluate anti-doping education. Performance-based evaluation of anti-doping education requires alignment between educational goals, content, and defined outcomes. Based on an existentialist teaching and learning philosophy, we aimed to develop and test an anti-doping impact evaluation tool, to assess the impact of anti-doping education on doping awareness, literacy (DAL), perceived trust, and legitimacy. We propose that the impact of anti-doping education is best captured through assessment of situation-specific (social) cognitive mediators of actions that influence athletes' choices in the context of sport-related goals. In phase one, we aimed to develop and test the Generating Research-based Assessment Data to Evidence the ImpacT of anti-doping education (GRADE IT) evaluation tool that comprised a set of social cognitive components: anti-doping knowledge, DAL, perceived trust, and legitimacy of anti-doping (organizations). In phase two we assessed whether anti-doping education impacts knowledge, the three DAL stages (functional, interactive, and critical literacy), perceived trust and legitimacy. Phase one enrolled 986 junior elite athletes, and we showed that all GRADE IT components performed well. After revision of the tool for phase two, we validated the assumption that anti-doping education impacts the likelihood that athletes will make the “right” choice (based on a new set of data from 1,255 junior elite athletes). Comprehensive education was associated with higher scores for all stages of DAL, as well as perceived trust and legitimacy. Even athletes reporting no education had positive scores for all included outcomes, supporting the assumption that most athletes wish to engage in clean sport behaviors and might need anti-doping education not to prevent them from doping, but rather to reinforce their commitment to clean sport. In conclusion, GRADE IT, which is available in 23 languages, is a suitable tool for application to young, emerging athletes to satisfy the ISE requirement for evaluating anti-doping education programs. Researchers and practitioners alike are advised to collect additional data to further validate the tool for adult athletes, and to apply it longitudinally to identify if changes in doping prevention policies have a delayed effect on DAL, perceived trust, and legitimacy.
Highlights
Using education to raise awareness, inform and communicate is one of the main aims of the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) strategy to prevent intentional and unintentional antidoping rule violations (ADRV; World Anti-Doping Agency, 2021c)
Whereas the previous phase of the study focused on the provider (Gatterer et al, 2020) and consumer sides (Gatterer et al, 2021) of anti-doping education, the primary goal of the current study was to develop and test a tool for assessing the expected outcomes of the anti-doping education provided by National Anti-Doping Organizations (NADOs) and International Federations (IFs) under the International Standard for Education (ISE)
Phase One The aim of phase one was to develop an effective assessment tool with high content validity, in collaboration with internationally renowned experts in anti-doping with different research backgrounds. We named this tool GRADE IT, standing for “Generating Research-based Assessment Data to Evidence the ImpacT of anti-doping education;” and included markers/variables that we identified as relevant for promoting clean sport behavior or preventing anti-doping rule violations; these variables map onto the Doping Awareness Literacy (DAL) stages
Summary
Using education to raise awareness, inform and communicate is one of the main aims of the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) strategy to prevent intentional and unintentional antidoping rule violations (ADRV; World Anti-Doping Agency, 2021c). Nutbeam (2000) specifies three types of literacy, which are assumed to build upon each other and lead to greater empowerment: (a) basic/functional literacy (i.e., factual information), (b) communicative/interactive literacy (i.e., developing personal skills based on knowledge), and (c) critical literacy (i.e., information on social and economic determinants of health important to achieve policy changes) These three types of literacy have been shown to be associated with several health-related outcomes, including compliance with prescribed therapeutic regimes (Ad Hoc Committee on Health Literacy for the American Councol on Scientific Affairs, 1999; Nutbeam, 2000). The concept of Doping Awareness Literacy (DAL; see Figure 1), was originally developed by Andrea Petróczi and her team at Kingston University for the EU ERASMUS+ funded “SAFE YOU” project (safeyou.eu), and directly built on the health literacy concept applied to performance-enhancing drugs in competitive sport This initial model captures the process of DAL development in three distinctive stages: Knowing (Functional Literacy), Deciding (Interactive Literacy), Leading (Critical Literacy). Such a tool could be used for longitudinal studies to observe changes and connect them to possible changes in doping prevention strategies (e.g., the introduction of new rules and national legislative approaches, etc.)
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