Lesson video

Hello there.

Pleasure to have you with me.

It's Mr. Broome here with a lesson called, "Drugs in Sport" from the "Socio-Cultural Influences: Ethics and Behaviour" unit.

I think this is a fascinating topic as we delve into why certain athletes will decide to use performance-enhancing drugs to better their performance despite the fact that they're often prohibited or illegal, and actually, as we will find out, have many negative side effects.

Fascinating topic, as I said.

Let's get stuck in.

Okay, so by the end of today's lesson, you should be able to identify different types of performance-enhancing drugs.

Their effects and the reasons for and against taking them.

Here's your key keywords for today's lesson.

There are four.

They are performance-enhancing drugs, often shortened to PEDs, anabolic steroids, beta blockers, and stimulants.

Pause the video here if you'd like to see their definitions, but we will be learning more about all of those in today's lesson, which as you can see has two parts.

The first of which explain why athletes use PEDs.

Okay, why do athletes use PEDs or other performance-enhancing drugs to give them their full name? They are used in sport in different forms and for different reasons.

Sam says, "Which types have you heard of and why are they used?" Have you ever come across any of these performance-enhancing drugs? Maybe the sports that you follow may have had athletes discovered that they were using performance-enhancing drugs, and why were they doing so, if they were using them? Maybe you don't know any and that's fine, because in today's lesson, we're going to focus on three types of PED.

You may remember them from the keywords.

They are anabolic steroids, beta blockers, and stimulants.

Now, I just wanna note that in today's lesson we're going to be discussing some PEDs, which are banned substances, prohibited, in many cases, illegal substances, and their use is not being endorsed in this lesson.

But it is important that we're aware of the impact of PEDs on our favourite physical activities and sports.

So, sometimes PEDs are taken by athletes to stimulate muscle growth, okay? An athlete might want to have muscular hypertrophy.

Remember that word means growth of the muscle.

And a commonly used PED to achieve this is called anabolic steroids, okay? It's a substance which mimics the hormone, testosterone.

Now, Andeep has got a question for you and he says, "Which sports performers would benefit from increased muscle growth?" Because what we've got to note here is that not all sports would benefit from having an increased muscle growth.

Some sports people, in fact, would see a negative impact on their performance if they had bigger, heavier muscles.

And so what would you say in reply to Andeep? Which sports performers would benefit from increased muscle growth? We'll take a look in a moment.

Okay, here's a summary about anabolic steroids.

So they are used to mimic testosterone, which is a hormone found in the male body which helps muscle growth.

That helps them to train harder and longer, okay? Increase muscle mass and growth, but also, and perhaps most importantly, it speeds up the recovery from a heavy workout in the gym perhaps, so that those athletes can train again sooner.

If you imagine, that means you can increase the volume and have less rest and recovery time, and that's going to lead to that increased muscle mass and growth that we mentioned just before.

So if you go back to Andeep's question about which type of sport would suit the use of anabolic steroids, remembering that actually they're not allowed to be used in most sports, what would you have said? Here's some examples.

Weightlifting and sprinting.

Events where power and strength are rewarded, okay? If you look at the athletes involved in these sports, they have big, strong muscles, don't they? And so anabolic steroids would be effective for people who participate in those sports.

Quick check for understanding.

In which of these activities that you could see on the screen, might you find the use of anabolic steroids to benefit performance? Is it A, bodybuilding, B, shot put, or C, marathon? Okay, well done if you said both A and B.

Actually there were two activities there which would benefit from the use of anabolic steroids.

Bodybuilding, because essentially that is largely about muscle mass and muscle growth.

And they will be training for bodybuilding by lifting lots of weights.

As we've seen, anabolic steroids has a lot of benefits to people who are weightlifting.

Shot put is an explosive power event where muscle mass can be very beneficial.

And so, again, with shot put, we may see the use of anabolic steroids with shot putters.

Now, of the three sports people, marathon runners are not going to need big heavy muscles.

They're not looking for muscle hypertrophy.

They need light frames.

They need to be energy efficient because their event is long in duration and endurance based, okay? And so anabolic steroids is not going to be an attractive PED to somebody who's a marathon runner trying to improve their performance in marathon.

Well done if you said A and B.

Okay, Sofia's got a question for you.

It says, "Could it ever be beneficial in a sport or physical activity to slow down your heart rate?" This might be worth pausing here and thinking, is there a sport where it could be useful to actually have something which helps to lower your heart rate? What do you think? Most sports, we have a high heart rate, don't we, 'cause they're so energetic and the blood needs to be pumping around the body and delivering oxygen.

Why on earth would you want to slow down your heart rate? What do you think? Well, it's possible to slow down the heart rate using a PED called beta blockers.

Let's have a look at beta blockers.

So they're used by athletes to reduce the heart rate, but they also have some other impacts as well, which might be useful.

It reduces any muscle shakes.

It can reduce anxiety.

And it can steady your nerves.

So who would benefit from having, perhaps less anxiety, becoming very, very calm and steady, having a low heart rate, not feeling the effects there of the muscle shaking perhaps? What do you think? Here's some examples.

Archers would benefit from these impacts of using beta blockers because they need to hold that bow very, very steadily.

Their activity is based on very fine precision, and therefore using beta blockers could be an attractive proposition.

And also shooting, again, it's about holding an object as steady as you can, in which muscle shakes and being anxious and nervous is not going to help.

Having a high heart rate is not going to help.

The best performers are very calm, their accurate, and therefore beta blockers could help them to achieve that.

Okay, now, when people want to perhaps feel more alert, and that often happens in the morning, doesn't it, they may drink a coffee.

I wonder if you know people, who, one of the first things they do when they wake up because they're feeling sleepy, they want to feel more alert, is to go and drink a cup of coffee.

Why is that? Well, it's because that caffeine in coffee, which is also found in many energy drinks that you may know of, is what's called a stimulant, okay? Now, caffeine is a legal stimulant, although some competitions will limit its use, so you can't have a certain level of caffeine in your bloodstream.

Now, there are several other stimulants which are illegal or banned from use in sport such as amphetamines, okay? Even the popular energy drink Red Bull is banned in some countries or with some competitions.

All right? Now, some of the other benefits for sports people who are using stimulants would be that they would.

Well, we know they'll feel alert, but they'll also reduce fatigue.

So if you're feeling tired, it might be that they use a stimulant to help stop feeling tired.

And if they need fast reaction times in their sport, it might be that they use a stimulant to help them have fast reaction times.

Okay, so let's have a look at a summary here on stimulants.

Now, stimulants are used to mimic adrenaline.

That substance that our body naturally makes to make us feel alert and awake.

It stimulates the central nervous system and increases alertness, as we've already mentioned.

That will lead to us having quicker reaction times, okay? So athletes will use stimulants to have quick reaction times, and also to reduce or to mask the fact that they're feeling fatigued.

Who uses them? Table tennis players might use a stimulant because their sport really requires fast reaction times, doesn't it? If you ever seen a rally between two top tennis players, they are reacting with split-second precision.

And boxers, they may use stimulants.

Again, they need quick reaction times.

They don't wanna feel sluggish, do they? They want to feel alert and ready to dodge the punches that are coming their way with quick reactions.

So two sports there, which require fast reactions and therefore stimulants might be beneficial to their performance.

So quick check for your understanding.

Performance could be enhanced in two of these activities, which I'm about to show you by using beta blockers, and two of them could benefit from using stimulants, which way round is it? So we've got American football, darts, snooker, and cricket.

Which of those two would benefit from the use of stimulants and which of those might benefit from using beta blockers? Over to you.

Okay, let's start with American football.

Well done if you said that American footballers might use stimulants.

With darts players, what did you say there? Should have been beta blockers.

With snooker, again, beta blockers.

Same as darts.

That leaves cricket, which is stimulants.

Okay, let's have a quick think about why that is the case.

Well, with American football and cricket, why would they use stimulants? Well, of course these require fast reaction times, okay.

In the case of American football, dodging players who are coming to tackle you.

In the case of cricket, making a very quick decision about how to strike the ball or maybe you're one of the fielders who has to very quickly make a catch, okay? They may use stimulants.

Also, their games are quite long, and so they may need a stimulant to help them feel awake and alert.

However, darts players and snooker players, they don't really need to mimic the effect of adrenaline.

In fact, they would benefit from a nice, calm situation where they can focus on being precise and accurate.

And so beta blockers would be much more suited to them than a stimulant would.

Well done if you've got it the correct way around.

Okay, so here's the task for this first section of the lesson.

I'd like you to think about golfers and gymnasts.

In combination with the three PEDs that we've looked at so far, which were anabolic steroids, beta blockers, and stimulants, I'd like you to go at sport at a time.

So let's begin with golf, and then how anabolic steroids, how beta blockers, and how stimulants might benefit performers in golf.

And then do exactly the same for gymnastics.

So for each sport, I want you to write a sentence explaining the extent to which each PED could be used to enhance performance in that sport.

So you should end up with six sentences, starting with golf and the combination with anabolic steroids.

Okay, pause video here, write your six sentences, and then rejoin me for some suggested answers of mine.

All right, so what might you have said about the golfer? Well, golfers and anabolic steroids, would they use anabolic steroids? Well, no, not really.

It's not that commonly used in golf, because golf is a sport which doesn't really rely on strength or muscle mass.

It doesn't massively enhance performance.

And so it's not regularly used.

We do see, particularly in recent years, some golfers really, sort of, getting bigger muscles so that they can drive the ball further.

And so it could be that, in some cases, anabolic steroids might be attractive to those golfers who want to drive the ball further and get bigger muscles.

But generally, it's not a PED that you would find used in golf very much, very often.

How about beta blockers? Well, beta blockers might be more attractive to a golfer than anabolic steroids.

And the reason for that is, well, we have different types of shot, don't we, in golf? And actually we've talked about precision activities like archery, shooting, snooker, and darts in today's lesson, but putting the ball in golf is a very precise movement, isn't it? And so, if a golfer was trying to put and they had shaky hands while they were doing so, that would really have a negative influence.

And so it could be that beta blockers are used to steady their hands and help putting performance.

Finally, what about stimulants? Well, some golfers, especially professional golfers, will play long rounds of golf and they'll play four days in a row in some other major tournaments.

And so the rounds of golf can last a long time and stimulants might be helped to use reduce fatigue and remain focused.

And so it could be used by golfers to help their performance.

How about gymnastics? Do exactly the same for gymnastics? What might you have said about gymnastics? Well, how about anabolic steroids? Well, gymnasts really rely on strength in events such as the rings, as we can see here in this picture.

And so, an increased in muscle mass and strength would be helpful.

So we might see the use of anabolic steroids in gymnastics.

Right, beta blockers.

Well, other disciplines are not so much about power, but perhaps more about balance, okay? And so things such as using the balance beam, somebody who's anxious and maybe has a high heart rate, possibly might want to use beta blockers to reduce the shakes that they might have, to reduce the anxiety and the high heart rate that they have to help them remain balanced on the beam.

And stimulants, well, some of the activities in gymnastics really require quick reactions, lots of energy, and lots of focus.

Activities such as the parallel bars in particular, where one slight error will require a very, very quick reaction to get you back in the right position, otherwise your performance might be over.

And so stimulants might provide that sort of quick reaction time that gymnasts would be looking for.

Well done if you noted how the three PEDs that we've looked at so far might be used by athletes in those sports.

And that brings us to the second part of today's lesson, which is to describe the impact of PED use.

So we know now why athletes are using them, despite them being prohibited and despite them being banned.

But what about the impacts of using them? Well, in professional sport, winning has become increasingly lucrative.

Lucrative means that there is an opportunity now to make a lot of money out of sport, and particularly those who are at the top of the sport and who are winning medals and trophies in competitions, they can make a lot of money out of sport.

That means that some athletes or some coaches, perhaps the entire team, and even in some cases, entire countries, have adopted a "win at all costs" attitude, which means that they will do whatever it takes to win.

And that of course, if we talk about whatever it takes, may result in them using performance-enhancing drugs despite them being banned and illegal.

Now, the athletes might be drawn to this idea of becoming famous, making lots of money out of competitions, or if you are successful you might get sponsorship deals, and they might think about the medals and trophies they can win, and that persuades them that using PEDs to cheat and gain an unfair advantage is something that they want to do.

Okay, so using any banned substance to gain an unfair advantage is unethical.

We've already talked about how they're banned and they're illegal.

It's also unethical, okay? But Jun says, "What does unethical mean?" And I wonder if you have an idea about what unethical means.

So, unethical means it's not morally acceptable behaviour.

The vast majority of people do not agree that this is the correct way to behave, using drugs to gain an unfair advantage over other people.

So PEDs also have negative side effects for health and wellbeing.

We've talked about how they might improve health in terms of, you know, okay, so anabolic steroids might improve muscle mass, so you're stronger.

But actually, all three of the PEDs that we've looked at today, have negative effects for health and wellbeing that athletes must know about and should consider before they even risk using them.

So anabolic steroids, the risk of using anabolic steroids is that you could get liver, heart, and kidney issues.

There's also a lot of psychological impact, such as having mood swings, becoming aggressive, or becoming depressed.

It can also lead to the risk of infertility, meaning that you couldn't have children.

With beta blockers, they have negative effects as well.

People who use beta blockers suffer from fatigue, dizziness, depression, mood swings, insomnia where they can't sleep, and decreased blood pressure.

Okay? So a long list there of negative side effects.

How about stimulants? Well, stimulants increase the heart rate and blood pressure, which can lead to a risk of heart attack.

People who use stimulants can become anxious and aggressive, and of course.

Well, we talked about coffee being a stimulant earlier, and you probably know that if you drink coffee before you sleep, it's not a great idea because it can lead to poor sleep.

Think about some of those even stronger stimulants that we've looked at today.

And it can also lead to dehydration because stimulants act as what we call a diuretic sometimes, and they mean that you go to the toilet more often and flush out the the water in your body.

And they can also be addictive substances, that it's difficult to stop using once you've started.

So as you can see, lots of negative side effects from using these substances, and lots to consider before anybody takes the risk of using them.

Here's a quick check for your understanding.

True or false? Athletes choosing to use PEDs do so at the risk of damaging their health and wellbeing.

Is that true or false? Well, of course that's true, isn't it? As we've seen on the previous slide.

Why? Well, all PEDs have potential negative and harmful side effects that all athletes should know about before they consider using them.

Jacob's question to you is, "Other than the effects on health and wellbeing, what else could happen to an athlete who gets found guilty of using banned and illegal PEDs?" What do you think? Maybe you've heard of somebody and you know what happened to them in particular.

Now here's somebody you may recognise.

I'm not sure.

We'll come on to him in a moment, but he is a famous example of a cyclist using PEDs.

Let's have a look in a moment because in general, athletes who use banned substances risked their career, their reputation, and their accomplishments, okay? There's a lot at stake.

The most decorated cyclist, now we come onto the guy in the picture, his name was Lance Armstrong, he admitted to using PEDs during his career.

This was actually after his career when he admitted it.

As a result, his titles were taken from him, his reputation was destroyed, and he was sued for his prize money.

He went from being somebody who lots of people really looked up to, to being somebody people didn't think much of at all because of the fact that everything we had seen him achieve had been assisted by the use of PEDs.

Alex has got a question for you and asks, "Why do you think he risked it all by using PEDs?" What do you think? We're not actually gonna go into this particularly, but if there's somebody nearby or perhaps you in a class, maybe pause a video here and have a chance to discuss with other people, why do some athletes, not just Lance Armstrong, but other athletes as well, risk it all by using PEDs? What do you think? Here's another example for you.

It's quite an old example now.

I'm sure this happened a long time before.

Most of you were bored, those of you who are watching this.

But in 1988, a Canadian sprinter called Ben Johnson shocked the world.

He won the 100 metre Olympic final way clearer of the field, and in a world record time.

He smashed the world record.

This image on the left is just near the finish line.

So you can see the gap that he had managed to create between several of the other best sprinters of the time.

Now, just three days later, Johnson had his medal removed from him, he was banned from athletics for two years, and that was all because he tested positive for anabolic steroid use.

So that gold medal and the world record that he had achieved was all due to being assisted by use of anabolic steroids.

And ever since, athletics has had a series of PEDs scandals involving some of its most famous athletes.

Okay, so what image have we got here? This is tour cycling, okay? Tour cyclists will spend days on the bike, maybe three weeks of different stages for almost every day for three weeks.

So it's a really gruelling endurance event.

Now, for many years, tour cycling has been associated with PEDs use due to large numbers of cyclists, including Lance Armstrong, who we've seen a few slides ago, being found guilty of using banned substances, okay? So, Lucas is thinking about these sports like sprinting and tour cycling.

He's got a question for you, which is, "What negative impacts can a sport suffer if it becomes associated with PED use?" What do you think about that? Well, if a sport is constantly in the media because athletes are being caught using PEDs, fans and spectators are gonna lose trust what they are watching is a fair competition.

Most people expect to watch sport and to see a fair competition between athletes who've just worked really hard or done whatever they can naturally to be great athletes, and not turn to the illegal use of PEDs.

Now we've got sponsors in most sports, and if the sponsor feels that the sport that they are funding or promoting is becoming tarnished by all the athletes using PEDs, they may withdraw their funding 'cause they don't wanna be associated with PED use.

And thirdly here, the sports role models such as Ben Johnson back in 1988, but also Lance Armstrong and many, many others, are setting a bad example, and that can lead to further bad publicity, lots of bad publicity and negative stories in the media, and it could have the knock-on impact of inspiring others to use PEDs.

Now, the governing bodies, you may have heard of governing bodies, people such as the International Olympic Committee, they spend huge amounts of money every year to test athletes for PEDs use, and educate them about the dangers, okay? The World Anti-Doping Agency, WADA, you may have heard of that one, is the organisation which leads the fight against drugs in sport.

But lots and lots of money is being spent on just trying to catch the people who are using drugs and educate athletes about why they shouldn't.

So quick check for your understanding.

Sports can suffer as a result of athletes using PEDs, entire sports.

Which of these could be a negative impact? Is it A, that the competition becomes more exciting, B, that fans lose trust in it being a fair competition, C, that role models inspire youngsters to use PEDs, or D, the sponsors withdraw their funding? Which of those do you think are negative impacts? Right, so well done if you spotted there that three of those answers were actually negative impacts of the sport, discovering that lots of its athletes are using PEDs.

So fans will lose trust in it being a fair competition, role models may inspire others, like youngsters, to use PEDs themselves, and sponsors may begin withdrawing their funding.

Okay, that brings us to the task for this second section of the lesson, and we're gonna have an argument.

How do you feel about that? Sofia has begun the argument by saying, "If you are a sprinter, using anabolic steroids is well worth the risk." What's your gut feeling about what Sofia has said there? Well, I'm gonna ask you to write a counterargument.

Whether you agree with her or not, I want you to take the stance that you disagree.

So I want you to write a counterargument to Sofia's statement, which recognises at least one ethical and two health impacts associated with anabolic steroid use based on what we've learned in today's lesson.

And that could be mental or physical health.

I'd also like you to write a potential negative impact on the sport of sprinting itself, okay? So what are all these negative impacts? And I want you to go against what Sofia has said there, and write a counterargument.

Pause the video here and write your counterargument, and come back to me in a moment with some suggested answers.

Okay, so what might you have said in reply to Sofia? You might have talked about the ethical impacts such as, it's cheating, it's an unfair advantage, and it goes against the principles of sporting competition.

Okay, ethical impacts.

You might also have said, because I asked you to also write two health impacts, you might have said that you may suffer liver, heart, or kidney issues.

You might have said that they will become aggressive, depressed, or suffer mood swings.

Finally, the impact on the sport itself.

Hopefully you said something that, "Well, actually it's not worth the risk because you should be setting a good example as a role model to the fans of the sport, to young people." You might have said that "If you get caught, you'll damage the sport's reputation." So you're thinking about yourself, or maybe fame, and money, and success that you can get, but actually you could have a really negative impact on sprinting's reputation.

Thirdly, something else you might have said about the impact on the sport is that "People like you cause money to be spent on testing which could be better spent on helping people become better athletes, better facilities, or lower ticket prices." So because so many athletes are using PEDs, lots and lots of money is being spent trying to deter them or trying to catch them.

This is money that could be much better spent on things like training facilities or lowering ticket prices so that more people could go and watch in the stadium.

Well done if you've written a really strong counterargument to Sofia's statement.

That brings us to the summary for today's lesson.

Let's read along together.

So some athletes use performance-enhancing drugs, PEDs, to gain an unfair advantage over the competition.

Many of these are banned substances and illegal.

Anabolic steroids, beta blockers, and stimulants are common types of PEDs used in sport due to their enhancing effects.

There are more types, but the three that you need to know about are anabolic steroids, beta blockers, and stimulants.

Now, all PEDs can have a negative impact on the physical and mental health of the user, as well as dire consequences of being caught using PEDs on the athlete's career.

And the sport itself can also suffer reputational damage and financial implications of having to test against the athletes using PEDs.

Okay, so that brings us to the end of today's lesson.

I hope you've enjoyed today's lesson.

It's certainly something I enjoy teaching.

It's a fascinating topic.

I'm sure all of us hope that our heroes aren't using PEDs to be the players and the performance that they are.

However, we do need to have an awareness that PEDs do exist, they are being used, and there are lots of negative side effects to using them.

Look forward to seeing you again in a lesson in the near future.

Buh-bye.