An analysis of the capacity of volunteer sports coaches as community assets in the Big Society

虽然有一些关于志愿者体育教练及其在社区参与中的作用的现有研究，但它往往有点分散和有限，主要位于美国，加拿大和澳大利亚的国家背景下。对现有经验证据的分析表明，志愿者教练研究缺乏鲁棒性，严谨性和理论基础，可用于设计未来的研究。现有的文献在格式和设计上都是描述性的，这也许反映了体育教练的学术研究是一个相对年轻的领域。因此，虽然人们普遍认为，志愿教练可以对个人，特别是年轻人的社会、身体和道德发展作出一系列贡献，但缺乏强有力的经验证据来支持这种说法。因此，如果人们越来越期望志愿体育教练能够通过体育活动为个人和社区带来好处，我们就必须更多地了解这一庞大的志愿工作队伍的需求、动机和优先事项。

Although there is some existing research on volunteer sport coaches and their role in community engagement, it tends to be somewhat fragmented and limited, and is located primarily in the national contexts of the USA, Canada and Australia. This analysis of the existing body of empirical evidence suggests that volunteer coach research lacks robustness, rigor and a theoretical grounding from which to design future studies. The available literature is descriptive in format and design, perhaps reflecting the fact that the academic study of sport coaching is a relatively young field. Thus, while it is widely claimed that volunteer coaches can make a range of contributions to the social, physical and moral development of individuals, particularly young people, there is a lack of robust empirical evidence to support such claims. If, therefore, there are growing expectations about the individual and community benefits that volunteer sports coaches can deliver through sports activities, it is imperative that we understand more about the needs, motivations and priorities of this large volunteer workforce.