College Athletes and Trouble

[Texsox]

just wondering. There is the pampered, spoiled athlete view of the world, and the hard working, doesn't want to mess up and loose a sholarship view of the world, and the it doesn't make a difference.

[samclemens]

to answer yes or no, you would have to make an unfair and gross generalization of all college atheletes. Whether someone plays an organized sport has absolutely nothing to do with their propensity to commit crimes.

[Balta1701]

to answer yes or no, you would have to make an unfair and gross generalization of all college atheletes. Whether someone plays an organized sport has absolutely nothing to do with their propensity to commit crimes.

Actually, there may very well be a reason why athletetic participation is correlated with crime rate, on either the good side or bad. I don't know the numbers so I'm not going to answer, but think about things like this:

 

For lower crime rates:

1. College athletes probably played sports as middle/high schoolers. Therefore, they weren't on the streets, and therefore could have lower crime rates.

2. College athletes have coaches who watch them more closely than many other university students.

 

For higher ones:

1. Colleges may overlook kids with questionable backgrounds if they possess enough athletic talent

2. College athletes may consider themselves priveledged and take advantage of others.

 

And so on. I'd bet you that if you took "College athletes" as a sample group and compared them with all college students or all Americans of a certain age, there would be a significant difference in the crime rates of the athletes. I have no idea which way, but I wouldn't say they're uncorrelated.