Soccer’s Heading Problem: Brain Changes Found in Amateur Players

The world’s most popular sport is reckoning with serious health concerns.

The largest study of its kind has now found that repeatedly heading a soccer ball can negatively impact the brain, even in amateur players who don’t report concussions.

among 352 amateur adult soccer players, those who took more than a thousand headers a year showed microscopic changes to the outer wrinkles of their brains, right behind their eyes, regardless of their age or sex.

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These players also performed slightly but substantially worse on memory and learning tests.

“What’s critically important about our study is that it shows, really for the first time, that exposure to repeated head impacts causes specific changes in the brain that, in turn, impair cognitive function,” explains neuroscientist Michael Lipton at Columbia University.

Lipton’s lab has been leading research on how soccer heading impacts the brain for over a decade now.

Contact sports, like American football, Australian rules football, and rugby, are also dealing with the downsides of repetitive head trauma, but in these cases, the discussion is often framed as a concussion crisis typically reserved for professionals.

Lipton’s research at Columbia University suggests that even mild bumps to the head can add up, and it’s not just professional athletes or those who report concussions who are affected.

Previous studies by Lipton have shown alterations to white matter among amateur soccer players compared to swimmers. Meanwhile, other studies have found white matter changes even without a history of concussion. But linking these brain