Abstract
The relative age effect (RAE) suggests that athletes born earlier in a sport's selection year are advantaged in terms of selection and playing opportunities. While prevalent in men's sports, little work has been directed at examining the RAE in women's sports. The studies to date present an equivocal pattern of findings across a variety of women's sports and competition levels. The purpose of the present study was to examine the prevalence of RAEs in elite Canadian women's ice hockey. Relative age and player position information on 660 female hockey players, across two levels of playing competition, were gathered from the Hockey Canada website. The chi-square analyses revealed no differences in the distribution of relatively older and younger players across the levels of competition, and overall there was a higher proportion of players born in Q2 (32.88%) than in Q4 (16.82%). Within the context of player position, both forwards and defense followed this same distribution. While different than the patterning of RAEs seen in men's hockey, the overall trend is similar in that opportunities for females to participate at an elite level are concentrated among relatively older players. The mechanism underlying this distribution is not related to maturational differences in height and weight. We anticipate that the increasing growth and popularity of women's ice hockey will result in the RAE becoming even more pronounced at all levels of participation.Acknowledgments: Hockey Canada