The motivational atmosphere in youth sport: coach, parent, and peer influences on motivation in specializing sport participants

This study qualitatively examined the motivationally relevant behaviors of key social agents in specializing sport participants. Seventy-nine participants (9-18 years old) from 26 sports participated in semi-structured focus-groups investigating how coaches, parents, and peers may influence motivation. Using a critical-realist perspective, an inductive content-analysis indicated that specializing athletes perceived a multitude of motivationally-relevant social cues. Coaches’ and parents’ influences were related to their specific roles: instruction/assessment for coaches, support-and-facilitation for parents. Peers influenced motivation through competitive behaviors, collaborative behaviors, evaluative communications, and through their social relationships. The results help to delineate different roles for social agents in influencing athletes' motivation

From ‘motivational climate’ to ‘motivational atmosphere’: a review of research examining the social and environmental influences on athlete motivation in sport

This chapter is intended to provide a comprehensive review of the various theories of social and environmental factors that influence athletes’ motivation in sport. In order to achieve this, a short historical review is conducted of the various ways in which motivation has been studied over the past 100 years, culminating in the ‘social-cognitive’ approach that undergirds several of the current theories of motivation in sport. As an outcome of this brief review, the conceptualisation and measurement of motivation are discussed, with a focus on the manner in which motivation may be influenced by key social agents in sport, such as coaches, parents and peers. This discussion leads to a review of Deci & Ryan’s (2000) self-determination theory (SDT), which specifies that environments and contexts which support basic psychological needs (competence, relatedness and autonomy) will produce higher quality motivation than environments which frustrate of exacerbate these needs. The research establishing the ways in which key social agents can support these basic needs is then reviewed, and the review depicts a situation wherein SDT has precipitated a way of studying the socio-environmental influences on motivation that has become quite piecemeal and fragmented. Following this, the motivational climate approach (Ames, 1992) specified in achievement-goals theory (AGT – Nicholls, 1989) is also reviewed. This section reveals a body of research which is highly consistent in its methodology and findings. The following two sections reflect recent debates regarding the nature of achievement goals and the way they are conceptualised (e.g., approach-avoidance goals and social goals), and the implications of this for motivational climate research are discussed. This leads to a section reviewing the current issues and concerns in the study of social and environmental influences on athlete motivation. Finally, future research directions and ideas are proposed to facilitate, precipitate and guide further research into the social and environmental influences on athlete motivation in sport. Recent studies that have attempted to address these issues are reviewed and their contribution is assessed

Educating and Supporting Tennis Parents Using Web-Based Delivery Methods: A Novel Online Education Program

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Applied Sport Psychology on 23 Feb 2018, available online: https://doi.org/10.1080/10413200.2018.1433250This study evaluated the effectiveness of a novel online education program for British tennis parents and their experiences of engaging in the program. Using a convergent parallel mixed-methods design, 13 parents completed pre- and post-program online questionnaires, while a subset of 9 participants also shared their experiences via an asynchronous email interview. Quantitative findings revealed positive directional changes for almost all of the variables in relation to emotional experiences, goal orientations, tennis parent efficacy, and general parenting efficacy. The contribution of the combined quantitative and qualitative findings and their practical implications are discussed

The International Guidelines on Natural and Nature Based Features for Fluvial Flood Risk Management:the concept and the way forward

The International Guidelines on Natural and Nature-Based Features for Flood Risk Management emphasize the role of nature-based solutions and natural infrastructure (e.g., beaches, dunes, islands, marshes) as an alternative to conventional hardened infrastructure for flood and coastal storm risk reduction. The Guidelines will equip decision-makers, project planners and practitioners with strategies that reduce flood risks to communities and improve infrastructure resilience. The document is organized so readers can begin where their interests lie. The Guidelines are an excellent starting point for the implementation of NNBF, but there is also a need to develop appropriate frameworks that quantify the (co-)benefits of NNBF. Furthermore, there are opportunities to connect NNBF to global initiatives like the UN Sustainable Development Goals, which even increases the potential of NNBF.</p

A qualitative investigation of the motivational climate in elite sport

Objectives: This study examined the construction of the motivational climate surrounding elite sports performers by investigating the behaviours of coaches, peers and parents that were perceived to be motivationally relevant by elite athletes.  Design: Qualitative – inductive.  Method: Twenty-eight national, international and world-class athletes (15–29 years old) took part in semi-structured focus groups and interviews investigating how they believe coaches, parents, and peers influence their motivation.  Results: An inductive content analysis indicated that elite athletes perceived a multitude of motivationally-relevant social cues. Coaches and peers were reported to be focal influences, whilst the role of parents appeared to be limited to emotional and moral support. Themes of feedback/evaluation, and pre-performance motivating behaviours were common to all social agents, whereas only the coach–athlete and peer–athlete relationships appeared to be important in moderating and directly influencing motivation towards sport. The influences of social agents related to the specific roles they performed in the athlete's life: instruction and leadership for coaches; emotional support, collaborative and/or competitive behaviours for peers, and for parents, a diminished role relative to when the athletes were younger.  Conclusions: A central finding of the paper is that there was no discernible one-to-one correspondence between specific behaviours and their impact on motivation. Instead, the findings suggest complex contextual interactions between the immediate behaviours of social agents and the impact on the athlete's motivation. If supported, this finding would necessitate new and novel approaches in future research in order to facilitate a more advanced understanding of athlete motivation in elite sport

Optimizing the role of the tennis parent: an action research study

Optimizing the role of the tennis parent: an action research stud

A qualitative synthesis of research into social motivational influences across the athletic career span

This study represents a qualitative synthesis of research examining the socio-environmental influences of coaches, parents and peers on athlete motivation, across the athletic career-span. Using a critical-realist perspective, meta-interpretation methodology was deployed to search and analyse the literature. On-going, iterative analysis generated new areas of enquiry and new search terms, until the emerging analysis reached the points of saturation. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were developed during this process to produce a clear statement of applicability for the study. In the final analysis, a developmental structure was specified to describe the athletic career trajectory, together with a horizontal structure capturing seven domains of the motivational atmosphere surrounding athletes (competition, training, evaluation, emotion, authority, social-support, and relatedness), and a vertical structure varying in terms of level-of-abstraction: The global/broad ‘motivational atmosphere’ containing contextual ‘climates’, built from immediate/situational ‘motivational conditions’. A model of the overall ‘motivational atmosphere’ in sport, based on a meteorological analogy, is offered with a view to stimulating critical debate and new research directions that reflect the complexity of interpersonal motivation in sport

A Framework to Evaluate the SDG Contribution of Fluvial Nature-Based Solutions

Nature-based solutions (NBSs) are measures reflecting the ‘cooperation with nature’ approach: mitigating fluvial flood risk while being cost-effective, resource-efficient, and providing numerous environmental, social, and economic benefits. Since 2015, the United Nations (UN) 2030 Agenda has provided UN member states with goals, targets, and indicators to facilitate an integrated approach focusing on economic, environmental, and social improvements simultaneously. The aim of this study is to evaluate the contribution of fluvial NBSs to the UN 2030 Agenda, using all its components: Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), targets, and indicators. We propose a four-step framework with inputs from the UN 2030 Agenda, scientific literature, and case studies. The framework provides a set of fluvial flooding indicators that are linked to SDG indicators of the UN 2030 Agenda. Finally, the fluvial flooding indicators are tested by applying them to a case study, the Eddleston Water Project, aiming to examine its contribution to the UN 2030 Agenda. This reveals that the Eddleston Water Project contributes to 9 SDGs and 33 SDG targets from environmental, economic, societal, policy, and technical perspectives. Our framework aims to enhance the systematic considerations of the SDG indicators, adjust their notion to the system of interest, and thereby enhance the link between the sustainability performance of NBSs and the UN 2030 AgendaRivers, Ports, Waterways and Dredging Engineerin

Natural flood management, lag time and catchment scale:Results from an empirical nested catchment study

Natural flood management (NFM) techniques attract much interest in flood risk management science, not least because their effectiveness remains subject to considerable uncertainty, particularly at larger catchment and event scales. This derives from a paucity of empirical studies which can offer either longitudinal or comparison data sets in which changes can be observed. The Eddleston catchment study, with 13 stream gauges operated continuously over 9 years, is based on both longitudinal and comparison data sets. Two years of baseline monitoring have been followed by 7 years of further monitoring after a range of NFM interventions across the 69 km2 catchment. This study has examined changes in lag as an index of hydrological response which avoids dependence on potentially significant uncertainties in flow data. Headwater catchments up to 26 km2 showed significant delays in lag of 2.6–7.3 hr in catchments provided with leaky wood structures, on‐line ponds and riparian planting, while larger catchments downstream and those treated with riparian planting alone did not. Two control catchments failed to show any such changes. The findings provide important evidence of the catchment scale at which NFM can be effective and suggest that effects may increase with event magnitude