International Journal of Human Movement and Sports Sciences 10(4A): 29-35, 2022 http://www.hrpub.org DOI: 10.13189/saj.2022.101305 Relative Age Effects among Malaysian Elite Adult Field Hockey Players Mohamad Izzudyn Fariss Mohd Hamizi 1 , Jeffrey Fook Lee Low 2,* 1 School of Education and Social Sciences, Management and Science University (MSU), University Drive, Selangor, Malaysia 2 Faculty of Sports Science & Coaching, Sultan Idris Education University (UPSI), Perak, Malaysia Received November 2, 2021; Revised December 16, 2021; Accepted January 24, 2022 Cite This Paper in the Following Citation Styles (a): [1] Mohamad Izzudyn Fariss Mohd Hamizi, Jeffrey Fook Lee Low , "Relative Age Effects among Malaysian Elite Adult Field Hockey Players," International Journal of Human Movement and Sports Sciences, Vol. 10, No. 4A, pp. 29 - 35, 2022. DOI: 10.13189/saj.2022.101305. (b): Mohamad Izzudyn Fariss Mohd Hamizi, Jeffrey Fook Lee Low (2022). Relative Age Effects among Malaysian Elite Adult Field Hockey Players. International Journal of Human Movement and Sports Sciences, 10(4A), 29 - 35. DOI: 10.13189/saj.2022.101305. Copyright©2022 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Abstract Relative age effect (RAE) has been identified as a contributing factor that could affect the chances of an individual attaining elite athletic level. The aim of this study was to identify the presence of RAE among adult Malaysian field hockey players. Birth dates of both men (n=270) and women (n=197) players were obtained from the official website of the 2020 national hockey competition and analyzed for significant differences in the distribution of their birth months using Chi Square Goodness of Fit test. Players’ birth months were distributed according to four quartiles. Presence of RAE was found for both men and women categories. Similar results were shown among the men’s semifinalists and those who were selected to the national team. However, no RAE was found in the women’s semi-finals teams as well as those who were selected to the national team. Suggested reason for the absence of RAE among the more skillful women players could be a lack of competition for places in the team and possibly due to a high turnover of players. Another reason posited was that the relatively younger players were able to persevere and overcome the selection bias, more with their technical and tactical skills than physical advantage. Keywords Relative Age Effects, Malaysian Field Hockey, Successful, Adults 1. Introduction Researchers have suggested several factors influencing the achievement of a high level of proficiency in the domain of sport, such as genetic and environmental influences [1]. A secondary or indirect factor affecting the development of elite athletes that has been increasingly examined is the relative age effect. Relative age effect (RAE) has been shown to become one of the factors that could either enhance or suppress the opportunity of an individual be an athlete [2]. RAE occurs when relatively older players are being preferred to rather than their relatively younger peers although they are in the same age category [3]. Two popular theories have been proposed for the phenomenon. First, the maturation theory where relatively older athletes tend to be physically taller, heavier, and stronger than relatively younger athletes due to their earlier attainment of biological maturation (i.e., accelerated growth due to hormonal changes on the onset of puberty). [4]. The physical advantage tends to lead to greater success in athletic performance, particularly in sports that allow physical contact, such as soccer, rugby and ice hockey. Second, relatively older athletes are more likely to be identified by coaches as “talented” and get selected and stay longer in teams [5, 6]. The combination of these two hypotheses further promotes the relatively older athletes to invest in physical and psychological training, thus expanding their likelihood of staying in the sport [7].