The Emergence and Perpetuation of a Destructive Culture in an Elite Sport in the United Kingdom

Recent inquiries into elite sports in the United Kingdom have unearthed examples of destructive cultures. Yet, earlier research left destructive cultures overlooked. The purpose of this article is to: (1) outline the process of how a destructive organizational culture emerges and perpetuates in one Olympic sport in the United Kingdom, and (2) the features that regulate the process. We combined Action Research and Grounded Theory in a 16-month longitudinal study. The primary data collection strategies were ethnography and 10 focus groups, with athletes, coaches, parents and the national governing body (NGB). Twenty-six individual interviews with stakeholders supplemented these. A destructive culture emerged during radical changes, and antagonism in the power relations between the NGB and stakeholders characterised this process. Denial of responsibility and social weighting neutralised the stigma of perpetuating antagonism. In conclusion, sports organizations should be vigilant of how ignoring and denying antagonism could lead to a destructive culture

Dynamics of positive- and negative-mass solitons in optical lattices and inverted traps

We study the dynamics of one-dimensional solitons in the attractive and repulsive Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) loaded into an optical lattice (OL), which is combined with an external parabolic potential. First, we demonstrate analytically that, in the repulsive BEC, where the soliton is of the gap type, its effective mass is \emph{negative}. This gives rise to a prediction for the experiment: such a soliton cannot be not held by the usual parabolic trap, but it can be captured (performing harmonic oscillations) by an anti-trapping inverted parabolic potential. We also study the motion of the soliton a in long system, concluding that, in the cases of both the positive and negative mass, it moves freely, provided that its amplitude is below a certain critical value; above it, the soliton's velocity decreases due to the interaction with the OL. At a late stage, the damped motion becomes chaotic. We also investigate the evolution of a two-soliton pulse in the attractive model. The pulse generates a persistent breather, if its amplitude is not too large; otherwise, fusion into a single fundamental soliton takes place. Collisions between two solitons captured in the parabolic trap or anti-trap are considered too. Depending on their amplitudes and phase difference, the solitons either perform stable oscillations, colliding indefinitely many times, or merge into a single soliton. Effects reported in this work for BECs can also be formulated for optical solitons in nonlinear photonic crystals. In particular, the capture of the negative-mass soliton in the anti-trap implies that a bright optical soliton in a self-defocusing medium with a periodic structure of the refractive index may be stable in an anti-waveguide.Comment: 22pages, 9 figures, submitted to Journal of Physics

Me, Myself, and My Thoughts: The Influence of Brooding and Reflective Rumination on Depressive Symptoms in Athletes in the United Kingdom

Individual differences in vulnerability to depression are still underexplored in athletes. We tested the influence of different brooding and reflective rumination profiles (i.e. repetitive thought processes in response to low/depressed mood) on the odds of experiencing clinically relevant depressive symptoms in competitive athletes (N=286). The Patient Health Questionnaire 9 (PHQ – 9) and the Ruminative Responses Scale (RRS-short form) were utilized to measure depression and rumination, respectively. Compared to athletes with a low brooding/reflection profile, athletes with a high brooding/reflection profile had significantly higher odds of experiencing clinical levels of depressive symptoms (OR=13.40, 95% CI=3.81– 47.11). A high reflection/low brooding profile was not, however, related to increased odds of depressive symptoms. Future research could extend our findings by exploring determinants of ruminative tendencies, especially brooding, in athletes. Furthermore, psychological interventions targeting rumination could be examined as a potential prevention and treatment approach to tackling depressive symptoms in athletes

A Qualitative Meta-Study of a Decade of the Holistic Ecological Approach to Talent Development

The Holistic-Ecological Approach (HEA) was introduced in 2010, and it is now important to provide a critical review after a decade of research elaborating on the framework. The purpose of this study was to critically assess the methodological and theoretical trends in research using the HEA in the study of athletic talent development environments (ATDE). We used a qualitative meta-study to review twelve studies published from 2010 to the first quarter of 2021. Our meta-theory analysis found that future studies should consider the use of Bronfenbrenner’s work on development and address previous critiques on its use since it can limit the potential of the HEA re-search. In the meta-methods, we found that all studies used multiple and varied data collection strategies (e.g., interviews, observations, organisational documents). We also found a high degree of transparency and rigour exemplified by using multiple validity strategies. Method weaknesses were an underrepresentation of neutral or negative cases. The meta-data analysis showed that most ATDEs were classified as successful or unsuccessful ahead of data collection, suggesting potential confirmation bias. We also found that all ATDEs had competing findings, which suggests a need for exploring negative or ambiguous findings. Future research could benefit from clarifying the use of underlying theoretical assumptions; contrasting findings with neutral cases, outliers, and negative cases to clarify the definition of successful ATDEs; and expanding on the methodological approach

Media events and cosmopolitan fandom:"Playful nationalism' in the Eurovision Song Contest

Academic literature on media events is increasingly concerned with their global dimensions and the applicability of Dayan and Katz's (1992) theoretical concept in a post-national context. This paper contributes to this debate by exploring the Eurovision Song Contest as a global media event. In particular, we employ a perspective from 'inside the media event', drawing upon empirical material collected during the 2014 Eurovision final in Copenhagen and focusing on the experiences of fans attending the contest. We argue that the ESC as a media event is experienced by its fans as a cosmopolitan space, open and diverse, whereas national belonging is expressed in a playful way tied to the overall visual aesthetics of the contest. However, the bounded and narrow character of participation render this cosmopolitan space rather limited