Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP17585
Authors: Pascal Courty; Jeffrey Cisyk
Abstract: We propose an analysis of sports injury interventions founded on the assertion that sports injuries may be due to both uncontrollable risks (accidents from participating in sports) and controllable risks (athlete’s deliberate choices in risk-taking). Athletes under-adopt injury interventions that increase the cost of taking risk and over-adopt those that decrease this cost. We apply this insight to discuss several interventions used in practice and provide a tool to assess injury policies. We argue that interventions that de-escalate risk, such as return-to-play rules, should be favoured relative to those that tend to escalate risk, such as a treatment program.
Keywords: sports injury; injury intervention; injury policy; risk-taking; mandatory equipment; return to play; safe play; prevention; treatment
JEL Codes: I12; Z28
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| return-to-play rules (Z28) | baseline injury cost (J32) |
| return-to-play rules (Z28) | risk-taking behavior among athletes (Z22) |
| treatment programs (I38) | perceived cost of injury (J17) |
| treatment programs (I38) | risk-taking behavior among athletes (Z22) |
| higher costs associated with risk (G22) | risk-taking behavior (D91) |
| overall impact of intervention (I24) | total injury costs (J28) |