Parents are often faced with conflicting advice on how to raise their kids, with competing theories rearing their heads seemingly every year. And for Whistler parents, whose kids are often high-performance athletes, there’s another layer of complexity.
Dr. Brian Storey, associate vice-president of Capilano University Squamish, and his son, Quinn, want to talk about all this and more for the Whistler Institute's Global Perspectives Speaker Series event Feb. 27. The father and son are well-suited to the task.
Brian holds a PhD in curriculum theory and implementation, a master’s in educational psychology and two bachelor’s degrees. He represented Canada in the 1996 Olympics in sailing and is the former president and executive director of Physical and Health Education Canada.
Quinn is studying a Master of Science in clinical psychology at the University of Victoria, and his research through the Healthy Relationship Lab examines men’s mental health, fatherhood, and underlying mechanisms in intimate partner violence. Quinn competed in the 2023 Pam Am Games in rowing and was an elite junior cyclist, among other athletic accolades.
In an interview-style conversation, the two “will touch on the roles of attachment, identity construction, development stages, and healthy/unhealthy social dynamics in sport,” according to the Whistler Institute. The duo spoke with Pique ahead of the event to give the audience a preview of what’s to come.
Building resilient humans
Competitive sports can seem to many like the most important thing in the world. But for Brian and Quinn, it’s a continual learning opportunity that extends outwards into a web of social connections.
“Sport is an arbitrary place to develop humans. It’s zero-sum and competitive, and we need collaboration," Brian said. "It’s touted as the way to build the next generation, but there are off-ramps to bad behaviour. There’s a deliberative process to reflection around sport experience that requires a parent and child to be engaged in processing their sport experiences together."
For Quinn, having parents who work in psychology-adjacent fields means he’s learned to evolve from an identity centred around sport, to understanding sport is an arena for personal growth that transcends competition.
“As a teenager I was resistant to it; it felt hard to accept when my identity was tied up in performance," he said. "My parents' messaging was strong and that benefited me long-term, especially as I transitioned between sports. Counterintuitively, that shift in mentality improved my performance."
Sports have given Quinn a sense of belonging to community, a strong work ethic and discipline, leadership skills and respect for other people. When both athletes walk away from a competition gaining something, that’s a positive outcome for him.
A lifelong learning process
“It’s been a joy to raise Quinn. Because I work in education, I got to have both my work and parenting intersect. I could test the things I was supposed to do 'right' and find out they didn’t work,” Brian said.
For Quinn, having two parents who were actively working on themselves meant he grew up in a home of constant learning, with theories floating around on the daily.
“There's so much theory and literature in sports psych—it feels very prescriptive," he said. "It’s funny to see how these things played out for me in real life… We were always talking about these concepts and ideas, and my parents were open about what they were trying, and it developed an interest in human behaviour, which lead to UBC and then clinical psychology."
Brian’s own athletic trajectory saw him overcoming barriers on his road to accomplishment, and he came to parenting with certain assumptions that what worked for himself translated to his son.
“Quinn and I had completely different upbringings. I didn’t have stable attachments, my lessons of sports were hard-won. I had to learn the language and theory and apply it in retrospect. Quinn had a parent set that reflected with him in action,” Brian said. “Objectivity as a parent is the main issue. When you overcome barriers yourself and get success, you can assume there is a parallel, but your child is their own unique individual. You can help facilitate their success versus assuming how that will unfold."
To learn more about the theory and practice at play in the Storeys' lives, visit the Whistler Institute online to secure a ticket to their talk.
