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February 14, 2005
Overeducation and running
Dana has remarked high proportions of medical doctors, teachers, and other people with advanced degrees running marathons, especially in the population of those running fast enough to qualify for Boston for example. I'm tempted to see a logical connection between educational level and propensity to prepare for marathons. But the connection I see is not that marathoning's a smart thing to do.
Maybe there's some truth to the idea that overeducated people are more likely than average to seek leisure activities involving considerable planning, long-term training, and delayed gratification, e.g. marathon training. I wonder if much of the phenomenon can be explained directly by environmental circumstances that, when extended to any group of people regardless of educational level, would produce more marathoners.
Doctors, teachers, people with lots of schooling may tend to wind up in jobs where they use their heads more than their hands, and use their heads to meet longer-term challenges. First this would leave their bodies ready for exercise rather than needing a rest. Furthermore, people who work with their heads would gravitate to leisure activities where: 1) use of your head gives you an advantage; 2) use of your hands and body doesn't depend as much on force or dexterity you (didn't) develop in your job; 3) the way you use your body hones how you use your head to engage in long-term challenges.
In addition, the overeducated are doubtless more likely to plan their own work, and then to extend this habit to their leisure. Not only do they plan their own work, but they may also be more likely to organize their own work as well, permitting them more easily to set aside time to run. They may even work in an environment that facilitates this (with showers in the building, for example).
Finally the overeducated probably tend to earn more than average, but are maybe not more likely to be independently wealthy. So they run, bike, or even play tennis and golf, but are more susceptible to train for a marathon than for a sailboat race, polo tournament, or the Paris-Dakar.
Marathon running is one sport where you're pitted against yourself more than in competition with other people. It's natural that anyone capable of sticking it out and following the training would find getting ready for a marathon gratifying, because you're almost sure to improve. Maybe that and the trend towards more head work, what I think of as no-collar jobs, explains why the number of people running marathons keeps increasing.
Posted by Mark at February 14, 2005 07:56 AM