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By Harry Wu, 21st Century Business Herald, SFC

With the booming development of China"s sports industry, sports psychology is becoming increasingly important, said Marianne Engle, American clinical psychologist and sports psychologist.

“Chinese children now are playing a lot more sports. And of course, I think sports are great, but the balance is what"s important,” she emphasized in a recent interview with 21st Century Business Herald.

“It"s very important the kids are allowed to play sports and not have it just being to be excellent, but to actually enjoy themselves and learn some skills,” she added. “So one of the psychological things for parents is for them to understand that making their children feel badly if they can"t win is not good for children"s self-esteem, sense of self and who they are as people.”

In the US, 60% of kids drop out of sports by the age of 13, because there"s too much pressure and they don"t want to do it anymore. So she think watching pressure is incredibly important. 

Engle has written a sports psychology program for youth athletes and coaches to enhance commitment, physical and mental skill building, and group dynamics. She is currently on the faculty of the NYU Langone Medical School. She has held faculty appointments at Harvard, MIT, and UCSD in addition to being a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Sport and Society.