Proposed modifications to the conceptual model of coaching efficacy and additional validity evidence for the Coaching Efficacy Scale II-High School Teams

The purpose of this study was to determine whether theoretically relevant sources of coaching efficacy could predict the measures derived from the Coaching Efficacy Scale II-High School Teams (CES II-HST). Data were collected from head coaches of high school teams in the United States (N=799). The analytic framework was a multiple-group confirmatory factor analysis with ordered-categorical indicators and observed covariates. Applying this framework to the conceptual model of coaching efficacy (CMCE) resulted in a statistical model equivalent to a multiple-group multivariate regression with latent outcomes. Results provided evidence for the ability of measures derived from the CES II-HST to be predicted by theoretically relevant sources of coaching efficacy and suggested modifications to the CMCE.     

An Evaluation of the Psychometric Properties of the Coaching Efficacy Scale for Coaches From the United States of America

This study extends validity evidence for the Coaching Efficacy Scale (CES; Feltz, Chase, Moritz, & Sullivan, 1999) by providing an evaluation of the psychometric properties of the instrument from previously collected data on high school and college coaches from United States. Data were fitted to a multidimensional item response theory model. Results offered some supporting evidence concerning validity based on the fit of a multidimensional conceptualization of coaching efficacy (i.e., motivation, game strategy, technique, and character building) as compared to a unidimensional conceptualization of coaching efficacy (i.e., total coaching efficacy), the fit of the majority of items to the measurement model, the internal consistency of coaching efficacy estimates, and the precision of total coaching efficacy estimates. However, concerns exist relating to the rating scale structure, the precision of multidimensional coaching efficacy estimates, and misfit of a couple of items to the measurement model. Practical recommendations for both future research with the CES and for the development of a revised instrument are forwarded.     

社会足球青训机构教练员能力因素的研究

该文采用逻辑分析法和文献资料法来进行社会足球青训机构教练员能力因素的研究。社会足球青训机构教练员是足球教练员这个群体中的一个分类,随着草根足球和校园足球在中国的不断发展,社会足球青训机构教练员的数量正在不断增加。现阶段,社会足球青训机构教练员是绝大部分青少年的“足球启蒙教练”,因此对其能力因素的研究十分重要。该文以社会足球青训机构教练员为研究对象,研究了其指导运动训练能力、临场指挥比赛能力、团队管理能力和影响能力的综合因素。通过研究发现社会足球青训机构教练员需要各种能力,但最为重要的是指导运动训练的能力。     

Attitudes of Volunteer Coaches toward Significant Youth Sport Issues

A questionnaire consisting of 20 positive and negative statements frequently made about youth sports was completed by 423 nonschool youth sport coaches from Illinois and Missouri. The coaches indicated to what degree they agreed with the statements for the sport in general, and for the particular program in which they coached. Coaches from eight sports were sampled: baseball/softball, basketball, football, gymnastics, hockey, soccer, swimming, and wrestling. The results revealed that coaches have generally favorable attitudes toward youth sports, supporting the value of participation for the well-being of children. One exception to the coaches' generally favorable attitudes was their moderate agreement that too much emphasis is placed on winning. It also was found that the coaches' 20 specific agreement ratings could be reduced to 4 interpretable factors—“positive attitudes,” “negative facets of youth sports programs,” “negative consequences for participants,” and “equipment and facilities not adequate.” Factor scores computed for these factors were found to differ as a function of sport coached and the coach's education, formal training, coaching experience, sex, occupation, and community size. In a second section of the survey, the coaches rated the importance of including various technical and sport science topics in coaching clinics and workshops.     

莆田地区青少年篮球业余训练的调查分析

运用文献资料法、问卷调查法和对比分析法等研究方法,对莆田地区有代表性的中学和业余体校青少年篮球业余训练的状况进行了研究。研究表明：莆田地区普遍存在经费短缺、由于升学压力和学生负担过重而使得业余训练不够系统化、教练员的培训不能保证等突出问题。这些问题制约了莆田地区青少年篮球运动业余训练工作的健康发展。但同时也存在教练员队伍比较年轻、绝大部分教练员热爱青少年篮球业余训练工作、教练员队伍知识层次较高等有利因素。     

Volunteer youth sport coaches' perspectives of coaching education/certification and parental codes of conduct

The vast majority of youth sport programs in the United States relies primarily on parent volunteers to serve as coaches. Unfortunately, most of these volunteer coaches have not received formal training to prepare them adequately for the role of youth sport coach. To exacerbate the issue, according to the popular media, parents and other adults can commit belligerent and even violent acts around, and often resulting from, poorly managed youth sport events. Although some efforts have been made to standardize curricula, provide training for coaches, and contain or prevent inappropriate parent behaviors, few efforts have been directed at investigating the self-described needs and concerns of the coaches from their perspectives. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the concerns and issues of youth sport coaches related to coaching and parental education. Five focus group interviews with 25 volunteer youth sport coaches were conducted to investigate these issues. Results were organized around four higher order themes that emerged from inductive content analyses: (a) coaching education content areas of need, (b) barriers and problems of offering coaching education, (c) coaching education format recommendations, and (d) efficacy of parental codes of conduct. Results were discussed in terms of the potential impact administrators, coaches, and parents could have in implementing formal coaching education programs and developing their coaching education practices.     

我国甲级队排球教练员执教效能的研究

运用问卷调查、访谈和数理统计等研究方法,对参加2004年全国排球大奖赛和全国排球锦标赛教练员的执教效能、教练员的个人风格、执教业绩与执教效能的关系等问题进行研究。结果表明,我国甲级队排球教练员执教效能由专项训练效能、创新效能、教育管理效能、指挥效能、学习科研效能、协作效能以及思想修养构成;不同性别、文化程度、运动等级教练员的执教效能没有显著差异;不同执教年限、职称、职务教练员的执教效能有显著差异;年龄对教练员的执教效能有非常显著影响;执教效能与执教业绩相关。     

Para-adventure: a hyper-dynamic problem for the inclusive coach

Recent research has recognized sports coaching as complex, chaotic and cognitively taxing for coaches. Against this backdrop, the present paper explores challenges faced by high-level coaches working with disabled performers. Specifically, it seeks to understand how coaches create mental models of performance in adventure sports and para-canoe. Five coaches were purposively sampled and underwent a semi-structured interview. A thematic analysis revealed conceptualizing the mental model as being mechanically related for all and as including a social construction within the para-canoe coaches. Reflection on the coaching process and on personal characteristics were perceived as important to individualized inclusive coaching. Coach training should particularly emphasize the need for critical judgement and decision-making skills within a similarly oriented social structure of coaches and support staff where applicable.     

Chris Nielsen: the forgotten Dane

Professional sculling was a leading international sport during the latter half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Not only did the sport produce champions, household names and elements of hero worship, it also provided opportunities for boatbuilders, technicians, sports managers and coaches to develop their skills and expertise, which enriched aquatics generally worldwide.

It was a period when organised sport, on an international scale, was beginning to intensify and consolidate. The Dane, Christian Nielsen, was one who seized the opportunities presented by professional sport. Nielsen revolutionised the art of boat building and the structure of boat racing, while he provided modern impetus into sports coaching and sports psychology. His contribution to sports history and aquatics is largely unknown or has been ignored, yet his genius and craftsmanship gave rise to a silent reach that extended to most parts of the globe.     

The role of community sports coaches in creating optimal social conditions for life skill development and transferability – a salutogenic perspective

Sport is widely recognised as having the potential to enhance the personal development of socially vulnerable youth, yet there is very limited knowledge on how community sports coaches can create optimal social conditions for life skill development and transferability. We adopt a salutogenic approach in order to study whether and how community sports coaches create these optimal social conditions. Based on the salutogenic framework, a thematic analysis was conducted of 15 in-depth interviews with community sports coaches providing sports lessons to socially vulnerable youth. As part of the interviews, the sports coaches were presented with several training scenarios and asked how they would respond in specific training situations. The results showed that the sports coaches aimed to create meaningful sporting experiences for youths. These meaningful sporting experiences were considered a precondition for keeping youths engaged in the sporting activities, as well as a precondition for life skill development. The sports coaches specifically focused on creating little moments of success and on making sure that the youths felt they belonged to a group. In order to ensure that the youths could experience moments of success, specific coaching strategies were implemented to increase the youths’ comprehensibility and manageability in specific sport situations. According to the sports coaches, experiencing little moments of success could contribute to an increase in socially vulnerable youths’ understanding of the everyday challenges that they face, as well as contribute to their ability to deal with these challenges. Creating meaningful sporting experiences may help youths ‘to learn to cope' – a skill that could be beneficial over their lifespan and in different societal domains.     

Talent development of high performance coaches in team sports in Ireland

Background: Coaches are central to the development of the expert performer and similarly to continued lifelong participation in sport. Coaches are uniquely positioned to deliver specific technical and tactical instruction and mentoring programmes that support the psychological and social development of athletes in a challenging, goal-oriented and motivational environment. The current study aimed to qualitatively investigate current coach learning sources and coaches’ educational backgrounds in team sports in Ireland. Methods: Coaches from five team sports in Ireland were asked to complete an online questionnaire. Subsequently male coaches (n?=?19) from five team sports who completed the questionnaire and met the inclusion criteria were invited to attend a follow-up semi-structured interview. Inclusion criteria for coaches were that they possess at least 10 years’ experience coaching their sport and were coaching more than 4 hours per week. Results/Discussion: Formal coach education does not meet the needs of high performance coaches who rely more on self-directed learning and coaching experience as their main sources of CPD. Although prior playing experience at a high level is both valuable and desirable, there are concerns about fast-tracking of ex-players into high performance coaching roles. Conclusions: Preferred sources of education and the best learning environment for coaches of team sports in Ireland are more informal than formal. Further research is needed to examine how this learning is applied in a practical manner by examining coaching behaviours and the impact it has on the athlete development process.     

The Use of Statistical Significance: A Commentary Related to Franks and Huck

Abstract

This paper focuses on the processes by which people become high school coaches. Occupational choice, professional socialization, and organizational socialization are examined, using qualitative data drawn from naturally occurring observations of coaches and informal discussions and in-depth interviews with them. Over 50% of the coaches had decided that they wanted to become a coach before entrance into college. The decision to become a coach was subjectively warranted by personal characteristics and experiences in sports, a devotion to sport, and a desire to work with young people. Youth sport coaching and student teaching which involved coaching constituted the only formal professional socialization that most of the coaches received. However, because almost all of the coaches participated in organized youth and/or high school athletics, they had a first-hand opportunity to observe their own coaches and acquire some informal images and impressions about the coaching occupation from them. Regardless of whether a neophyte began as an assistant or a head coach, technical aspects of the job and the occupation's culture were acquired by observing and listening to more experienced coaches. Through these experiences, collective understandings began to form, and the shared meanings about the occupational culture took shape. Reality shock for most novice coaches came in the form of understanding the importance the coaching culture assigns to long hours and hard work and to the realization that coaching does take an enormous amount of time. By the end of the first season, a symbolic transformation takes place and internalization of institutional expectations occurs as the neophyte begins to understand what coaching is all about.     

Becoming a high school coach: from playing sports to coaching

This paper focuses on the processes by which people become high school coaches. Occupational choice, professional socialization, and organizational socialization are examined, using qualitative data drawn from naturally occurring observations of coaches and informal discussions and in-depth interviews with them. Over 50% of the coaches had decided that they wanted to become a coach before entrance into college. The decision to become a coach was subjectively warranted by personal characteristics and experiences in sports, a devotion to sport, and a desire to work with young people. Youth sport coaching and student teaching which involved coaching constituted the only formal professional socialization that most of the coaches received. However, because almost all of the coaches participated in organized youth and/or high school athletics, they had a first-hand opportunity to observe their own coaches and acquire some informal images and impressions about the coaching occupation from them. Regardless of whether a neophyte began as an assistant or a head coach, technical aspects of the job and the occupation's culture were acquired by observing and listening to more experienced coaches. Through these experiences, collective understandings began to form, and the shared meanings about the occupational culture took shape. Reality shock for most novice coaches came in the form of understanding the importance the coaching culture assigns to long hours and hard work and to the realization that coaching does take an enormous amount of time. By the end of the first season, a symbolic transformation takes place and internalization of institutional expectations occurs as the neophyte begins to understand what coaching is all about.     

Developing a Scale of Perception of Sexual Abuse in Youth Sports (SPSAYS)

A scale was developed to measure perceptions of sexual abuse in youth sports by assessing (a) the perceived prevalence of sexual abuse committed by pedophilic youth sport coaches, (b) the perceived likelihood that a coach is a pedophile, (c) perceptions on how youth sport organizations should manage the risk of pedophilia, and (d) media influence on participant perception. Two studies were conducted for (a) the formulation of the conceptual framework, (b) the development of preliminary items, (c) an exploratory factor analysis, and (d) a confirmatory factor analysis, and structural equation modeling. The first data set (n?=?223) was used for exploratory factor analysis, and four factors (i.e., Management, Prevalence, Influence, and Likelihood) with 15 items emerged. With an independent sample (n?=?209), confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were conducted and found strong support for the scale's psychometric properties, including, convergent validity, predictive validity, and reliability. Theoretical and practical implications were discussed along with study limitations and suggestions for future studies.     

A multimethod examination of the relationship between coaching behavior and athletes' inherent self-talk

The aim of the present research was to investigate the relationship between coaching behavior and athletes' inherent self-talk (ST). Three studies were conducted. The first study tested the construct validity of the Coaching Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ) in the Greek language, and provided support for its original factor structure. The second study examined the relationships between coaching behavior and athletes' ST in field, with two different samples. The results showed that supportive coaching behavior was positively related to positive ST (in one sample) and negatively related to negative ST (in both samples), whereas negative coaching behavior was negatively related to positive ST (in one sample) and positively related to negative ST (in both samples). Finally, the third study examined the relationships experimentally, to produce evidence regarding the direction of causality. The results showed that variations in coaching behavior affected participants' ST. Overall, the results of the present investigation provided considerable evidence regarding the links between coaching behavior and athletes' ST and suggested that coaches may have an impact on athletes' thoughts.     

Extending validity evidence for multidimensional measures of coaching competency

This study extended validity evidence for multidimensional measures of coaching competency derived from the Coaching Competency Scale (CCS; Myers, Feltz, Maier, Wolfe, & Reckase, 2006) by examining use of the original rating scale structure and testing how measures related to satisfaction with the head coach within teams and between teams. Motivation, game strategy, technique, and character building comprised the dimensions of coaching competency. Data were collected from athletes (N = 585) nested within intercollegiate men's (g = 8) and women's (g = 13) soccer and women's ice hockey (g = 11) teams (G = 32). Validity concerns were observed for the original rating scale structure and the predicted positive relationship between motivation competency and satisfaction with the coach between teams. Validity evidence was offered for a condensed post hoc rating scale and the predicted relationship between motivation competency and satisfaction with the coach within teams.     

Examining the relationships between challenge and threat cognitive appraisals and coaching behaviours in football coaches

Previous research demonstrates that sports coaching is a stressful activity. This article investigates coaches’ challenge and threat cognitive appraisals of stressful situations and their impact on coaching behaviour, using Blascovich and Mendes’ (2000) biopsychosocial model as a theoretical framework. A cross-sectional correlational design was utilised to examine the relationships between irrational beliefs (Shortened general attitude and belief scale), challenge and threat appraisals (Appraisal of life events scale), and coaching behaviours (Leadership scale for sports) of 105 professional football academy coaches. Findings reveal significant positive associations between challenge appraisals and social support, and between threat appraisals and autocratic behaviour, and a significant negative association between threat appraisals and positive feedback. Results also show that higher irrational beliefs are associated with greater threat, and lesser challenge cognitive appraisals. However, no associations were revealed between irrational beliefs and challenge cognitive appraisals. Additionally, findings demonstrate a positive relationship between age and training and instruction. Results suggest that practitioners should help coaches to appraise stressful situations as a challenge to promote positive coaching behaviours.     

Gender differences in coaching philosophy: the case of female basketball teams

With the advent of Title IX, the proportion of female participants in interscholastic sport has risen sharply while the proportion of female coaches has dropped precipitously. This paper seeks to determine whether there are any differences in coaching philosophy by gender. Questionnaires were sent to the coaches of 600 high school girls' basketball teams selected randomly from the 48 contiguous states. There were 250 usable ones returned for a response rate of 42%. The questionnaires included items designed to assess the attitudes and behaviors of coaches in five areas of coaching philosophy: (1) the coach's role in the overall development of athletes; (2) conditions believed essential to maximize team performance; (3) team rules used; (4) use of sports aphorisms; and (5) expectations of athletes. Summing the findings, we found that in 83 of the 100 comparisons there were no statistical differences in the means of the male and female coaches. In the 17 instances where there were statistically significant differences, 14 times the female coaches were on the more traditional side. Several possible explanations for this interesting finding are discussed.     

Evaluating the impact of a coach development intervention for improving coaching practices in junior football (soccer): The “MASTER” pilot study

ABSTRACT

The aim of this pilot study was to evaluate the impact of a novel coach development intervention (MASTER) on coaching practices of football coaches. The study involved six coaches (of 10–12 year old) from one representative football club (Australia February–July 2017). The 15-week multi-component intervention included a face-to-face workshop, ongoing mentoring, modelled training sessions, peer assessments and group discussions. MASTER is underpinned by positive coaching and game-based coaching practices and aimed to educate coaches on how to implement and operationalise a number of evidence-based coaching elements. At each of baseline and immediate post-intervention coaches were filmed three times and evaluated using a modified version of the Coach Analysis Intervention System. Using linear mixed model analysis, significant changes were observed for time spent performing playing-form activities [+15.4% (95% CI 6.01–24.79)(t(15) = 3.5, P = 0.003], with significant changes in the type of interventions undertaken and the nature of feedback given to athletes. Program feasibility was examined using measures of recruitment, retention, adherence and satisfaction. Results indicate program feasibility and high coach evaluation ratings. MASTER demonstrated effectiveness for improving coaching practices of football coaches during training sessions. Further large-scale trials will build evidence for the utility of MASTER for guiding coaching practices in football and other sporting codes.     

Perceptions of elite coaches and sports scientists of the research needs for elite coaching practice

A major objective of sports scientists and elite coaches is the enhancement of athletic performance. Despite this common goal, there is a general perception that research in sports science does not meet the needs of coaches. A study using survey and interview examined the perceptions of elite coaches and sports science researchers in Australia regarding the research needs of elite coaching. Congruence was found between coaches and researchers regarding research practice at the elite level. Both groups held common perceptions on the importance and application of research, the methods by which research questions are determined, and the qualities valued in elite coaches and sports science researchers. However, elite coaches perceived a need for more research in the area of sports psychology, dissemination of research findings via coaching clinics and sports-specific magazines, and the use of more appropriate "lay" language in information dissemination.