Coaches’ perceived pitfalls in delivering psychological skills training to high-level youth athletes in fencing and football

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

  • Niels Boysen Feddersen
  • Marcus Alexander Bygballe Keis
  • Anne-Marie Elbe

The current study examined how two high-level coaches in fencing and football perceived the challenges that emerged during a three-month coach education programme aimed at them delivering psychological skills training to athletes. We used action research as the study design and collected data using observations, six semi-structured interviews, and one focus group. We analysed the data using a thematic content analysis. Our findings showed that the coaches struggled with role clarity. The psychological impact was that coaches struggled with identifying the borders between delivering psychological skills training as a part of their coaching and when to refer athletes to sport psychology experts. The coaches also suggested that gaining more knowledge in sport psychology allowed them to analyse the athletes. However, the coaches viewed this as a potential area for abusing trust in the coach-athlete relationship. We suggest that coach education programmes should include content on ethical dilemmas to safeguard against potential abuse of the coach-athlete relationship.

Original languageEnglish
JournalInternational Journal of Sports Science and Coaching
Volume16
Issue number2
Pages (from-to)249-261
Number of pages13
ISSN1747-9541
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2021

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2020.

    Research areas

  • Achievement goal theory, attention, coach-athlete relationship, coach development, ethics, self-efficacy, sport psychology, Attention, Coach-athlete relationship, Coach development, Ethics, Self-efficacy, Sport psychology

ID: 270621948