Legal Implications of Steroid Use by Amateur Athletes

Introduction

Scarcely a day goes by when Americans are not confronted with headlines or commentators announcing the latest scandals involving amateur or professional athletes discovered using steroids. Given the enormous amount of attention directed at this trend in recent years, many observers are left wondering what all of the fuss is really about. In order to discern the facts, this paper provides a review and discussion of the scholarly and peer-reviewed literature concerning steroid use among amateur and professional athletes, followed by an analysis of the salient issues. A summary of the research and recommendations are provided in the conclusion.

Background and Overview

The use of various performance-enhancing drugs by competitive athletes is certainly not a new phenomenon. For hundreds of years, athletes from around the world have attempted to gain a competitive advantage in their quest for victory, and one such approach has been through the use of performance-enhancing substances (Allison, Diacin, & Parks, 2003). According to these authors, media attention and concern among educators and policymakers about drug use among athletes actually began in the 1950s. "At that time," they note, "concern focused primarily on Soviet athletes' use of anabolic steroids in the 1956 World Games in Moscow. During the 1960s and 1970s, sport governing bodies such as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and the International Olympic Committee banned specific drugs" (Allison et al., 2003, p. 2).

In 1976, amateur athletes were tested for prohibited substances at the Olympic Games in Montreal and again at the 1983 Pan American Games in Caracas, Venezuela. The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) banned anabolic steroids in 1973 and began random testing of student-athletes for performance-enhancing substances and recreational drugs in 1986 (Allison et al., 2003). Drug testing originally took place only at Division I football bowl games and at some NCAA championships; however, since 1990, football players in Divisions I-A, I-AA, and II, as well as Division I indoor and outdoor track and field athletes, have been subject to drug testing all year long. Furthermore, Allison and his colleagues report that all NCAA student-athletes are subject to drug testing at NCAA championship events and at post-season bowl games (NCAA, 1998). Not surprisingly, the use of such drugs has attracted attention both from those who would seek to gain a competitive edge and from those who would attempt to discourage such usage. To better understand the rationale behind these efforts, the general effects of steroids are discussed below.

References

Allison, P.C., Diacin, M.J., & Parks, J.B. (2003). Voices of male athletes on drug use, drug testing and the existing order in intercollegiate athletics. Journal of Sport Behavior, 26(1), 1.

Hill v. National Collegiate Athletic Association, 865 P. 2d 633 (1994).

NCAA. (1998, November). NCAA drug-testing protocol, 1998–99. Overland Park, KS, in Allison, Diacin, & Parks, 2003, p. 3.

Pedersen, W., & Wichstrom, L. (2001). Use of anabolic-androgenic steroids in adolescence: Winning, looking good or being bad? Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 62(1), 5.

Putnam, D.T. (1999). Controversies of the sports world. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

[University] v. Derdeyn, 863 P. 2d 929 (1993).