Inter-generational transmission of sports practice in Algerian families: Habitus formation, capital mobilisation and social reproduction

Abstract

This study examines inter-generational transmission of sports practice in Algerian families through a sequential explanatory mixed-methods design. The quantitative phase applied propensity score-matched binary logistic regression across 480 families (240 sport-participating; 240 matched comparators) drawn from eight provinces. Transmission rates diverged substantially between groups (78.3% vs. 23.1%; McNemar's χ 2 (1) = 145.67, p < .001, φ = .55, 95% CI [.47, .63]), with four independent predictors: parental sports level (OR = 3.44, 95% CI [2.16, 5.47]), family support (OR = 2.20 [1.66, 2.92]), parental educational attainment (OR = 1.76 [1.29, 2.42]) and household income (OR = 1.53 [1.13, 2.07]). Residence in southern provinces exerted a significant negative main effect on transmission probability (OR = 0.69 [0.49, 0.96]). The qualitative phase comprised 45 semi-structured interviews analysed through thematic analysis, applied within a constructivist epistemological framework, with inter-coder κ = .84 as a credibility mechanism acknowledging the tension with more recent reflexive approaches to thematic analysis, as discussed in the qualitative analysis subsection below, yielding five inheritance patterns and six thematic clusters. Framed within Bourdieu's theoretical triad of habitus, capital and field, the findings illuminate social reproductive mechanisms in a collectivist Global South context and develop the concept of ‘kinship capital’: resources mobilised through extended family networks as a contextual elaboration of Bourdieusian capital theory, explicitly differentiated from Bourdieusian social capital and grounded in prior scholarship on African kinship solidarity in sport. Gender analysis revealed higher male transmission rates (boys 82.1%; girls 74.3%), with family support demonstrating stronger predictive power for girls, functioning as social legitimation against structural barriers.