INVESTIGATION OF RELATIVE AGE EFFECT ON GYMNASTS COMPETING IN GROUP CATEGORIES

Abstract

The relative age effect is a phenomenon that has emerged especially in the educational processes of children. The fact that children born in the same calendar year have more than 11 months between them according to the month they were born brings along great differences in terms of their development. This situation is also seen in sports education. Especially in sports activities that started at a young age, the time difference between the birth quarters of the athletes born in the same year will cause their physical performance to be affected, as their physical development is affected. Relative age effect studies in gymnastics were carried out in individual branches, but no study was conducted on group categories. Most of the studies also mention the relative age effect. Whether there is a relative age effect on athletes competing in group branches of gymnastics has not been investigated before. Therefore, this study was conducted to understand whether there is a relative age effect in the groups categories in Rhythmic Gymnastics and Aerobic Gymnastics branches. As a result of the evaluations, it was seen that there was no relative age effect on the medal winners in individual and group categories in aerobic gymnastics. While there is a relative age effect in some parts of the three seasons examined in rhythmic gymnastics, there is a relative age effect in terms of the athletes who won medals in the individual and group according to the average of the three seasons.