Badminton players’ moral intentions : a factorial survey study into personal and contextual determinants

Improving and maintaining high ethical standards among athletes is a major challenge in sports, which requires sufficient knowledge on athletes’ moral intentions. This study advances our knowledge on athletes’ moral intentions by examining the personal and contextual determinants (factors) that influence moral intentions of badminton players. In a factorial survey study, a total of 171 participants were asked to respond to scenarios describing moral dilemmas in the context of badminton. This approach allows combining advantages from both classical experiments and survey methods, enabling the determination of the underlying principles of the judgments and intentions of respondents. Multilevel analysis indicated that intention to engage in the described behaviour was impacted by both the act and the gender of the subject. This study complements previous research on athletes’ moral intentions by the advanced method of factorial survey, while supporting the development of more specific approaches in the promotion of ethical behaviour in sports

Learning mode of small business owners

The aim of the paper is to explore the learning mode of small business owners, from a theoretical stance, and based on empirical evidence. We distinguish between the required learning mode, the actual learning mode and the supported learning mode. Data were collected using the focus group method in a very heterogeneous sample of Belgian small business owners. The results indicate several gaps between the required, actual and supported learning modes, of which many are due to unawareness of learning needs and lack of reflective learning among small business owners. The data also indicate among others that solutions to fill learning gaps proposed in the literature are not applicable to all owners, e.g. not all owners are able to learn through networks. Keywords: Belgium, learning capability, learning mode, learning gaps, learning process, learning support, reflective learning, research paper, small business owners, focus group

Does it really matter? A study on soccer fans’ perceptions of ethical leadership and their role as 'stakeowners'

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Interrelation of sport participation, physical activity, social capital and mental health in disadvantaged communities : a sem-analysis

Background : The Health through Sport conceptual model links sport participation with physical, social and psychological outcomes and stresses the need for more understanding between these outcomes. The present study aims to uncover how sport participation, physical activity, social capital and mental health are interrelated by examining these outcomes in one model. Methods : A cross-sectional survey was conducted in nine disadvantaged communities in Antwerp (Belgium). Two hundred adults (aged 18-56) per community were randomly selected and visited at home to fill out a questionnaire on socio-demographics, sport participation, physical activity, social capital and mental health. A sample of 414 adults participated in the study. Results : Structural Equation Modeling analysis showed that sport participation (beta = .095) and not total physical activity (beta = .027) was associated with better mental health. No association was found between sport participation and community social capital (beta = .009) or individual social capital (beta = .045). Furthermore, only community social capital was linked with physical activity (beta = .114), individual social capital was not (beta = -.013). In contrast, only individual social capital was directly associated with mental health (beta = .152), community social capital was not (beta = .070). Conclusion : This study emphasizes the importance of sport participation and individual social capital to improve mental health in disadvantaged communities. It further gives a unique insight into the functionalities of how sport participation, physical activity, social capital and mental health are interrelated. Implications for policy are that cross-sector initiatives between the sport, social and health sector need to be supported as their outcomes are directly linked to one another