A grounded theory of inspirational coach leadership

The purpose of this study was to develop a grounded theory of the process of inspirational coach leadership in sport. A Straussian grounded theory methodology was used. Semi‐structured interviews and focus groups were conducted with athletes (n = 22) and coaches (n = 15). Data were analyzed through a process of open and axial coding, and theoretical integration. Through the process of analysis, data were broken down into smaller units (concepts), relationships between concepts were identified, and a substantive grounded theory was developed. The grounded theory of inspirational coach leadership was built around the core category of “athlete(s) inspired through changed awareness of their capabilities.” The core category was underpinned by three categories: (a) establishment of mutual trust and respect with athletes, whereby coaches need to establish trust with athletes in order to inspire athletes; (b) conditions under which inspiration has the potential to occur, which highlighted that athletes are inspired in situations where they are vulnerable or ignorant regarding their potential; and (c) coach acts to change athlete's awareness of their capabilities, which denotes the specific behaviors coaches should display to inspire athletes in such conditions. The theory also highlights that a range of contextual factors relating to the coach, athletes, and performance‐environment interact to impact upon the process. The theory predicts that consistency between coach behavior and the conditions in which inspiration can occur will lead to athlete inspiration, but only if the coach has established a foundation of trust and respect with the athlete

“You really could be something quite special”: a qualitative exploration of athletes' experiences of being inspired in sport

Objectives: The purpose of this research was to provide an explicit examination of inspiration in sport. In Study 1, we explored (a) what inspires athletes in sport, and (b) the consequences of being inspired. The aims of Study 2 were to explore (a) the contexts in which leaders inspired athletes, (b) leader behaviours and actions that inspire athletes, and (c) the consequences of being inspired by leaders. Design: Two qualitative descriptive studies were conducted in order to explore athletes' experiences of being inspired. Method: In Study 1, 95 athletes wrote about an experience of being inspired in sport. Study 2 utilised semi-structured interviews to explore 17 athletes' experiences of being inspired by leadership. Data were analysed via inductive thematic analysis. Results: In Study 1, athletes' responses revealed three sources of inspiration: personal performance, accomplishments, and thoughts; role models; and leadership. Findings from Study 2 indicated that athletes were inspired by a range of leadership behaviours (e.g., demonstrations of belief) in a variety of, mainly negative, situations (e.g., following poor performance). Broadly, findings from both studies revealed inspiration to impact on athletes' awareness of their capabilities, confidence, motivation, and behaviour. Conclusions: Overall, the findings indicate that an experience of inspiration can be evoked by a range of sources (most prominently leadership) and can have a powerful effect on athletes and their performance. Further research is required to understand how and why leaders can exert an inspirational impact on athletes

CIRCLE-EQUIVARIANT CLASSIFYING SPACES AND THE RATIONAL EQUIVARIANT SIGMA GENUS

Abstract. We analyze the circle-equivariant spectrum MStringC which is the equivariant analogue of the cobordism spectrum MU〈6 〉 of stably almost complex manifolds with c1 = c2 = 0. In [Gre05], the second author showed how to construct the ring T-spectrum EC representing the T-equivariant elliptic cohomology associated to a rational elliptic curve C. In the case that C is a complex elliptic curve, we construct a map of ring T-spectra MStringC → EC which is the rational equivariant analogue of the sigma orientation of [AHS01]. Our method gives a proof of a conjecture of the first author in [And03b]. Content

Data from: Is the enhanced dispersal rate seen at invasion fronts a behaviourally plastic response to encountering novel ecological conditions?

As a population expands into novel areas (as occurs in biological invasions), the range edge becomes dominated by rapidly dispersing individuals—thereby accelerating the rate of population spread. That acceleration has been attributed to evolutionary processes (natural selection and spatial sorting), to which we add a third complementary process: behavioural plasticity. Encountering environmental novelty may directly elicit an increased rate of dispersal. When we reciprocally translocated cane toads (Rhinella marina) among study sites in southern Australia, the transported animals massively increased dispersal rates relative to residents (to an extent similar to the evolved increase between range-core versus invasion-front toad populations in Australia). The responses of these translocated toads show that even range-core toads are capable of the long-distance dispersal rates of invasion-front conspecifics and suggest that rapid dispersal (rather than evolving de novo) has simply been expanded from facultative to constitutive expression

Toads on Lava: Spatial Ecology and Habitat Use of Invasive Cane Toads (Rhinella marina) in Hawai'i.

Most ecological research on cane toads (Rhinella marina) has focused on invasive populations in Australia, ignoring other areas where toads have been introduced. We radio-tracked and spool-tracked 40 toads, from four populations on the island of Hawai'i. Toads moved extensively at night (mean 116 m, from spool-tracking) but returned to the same or a nearby retreat-site each day (from radio-tracking, mean distance between successive retreat sites 11 m; 0 m for 70% of records). Males followed straighter paths during nocturnal movements than did females. Because moist sites are scarce on the highly porous lava substrate, Hawai'ian toads depend on anthropogenic disturbance for shelter (e.g. beneath buildings), foraging (e.g. suburban lawns, golf courses) and breeding (artificial ponds). Foraging sites are further concentrated by a scarcity of flying insects (negating artificial lights as prey-attractors). Habitat use of toads shifted with time (at night, toads selected areas with less bare ground, canopy, understory and leaf-litter), and differed between sexes (females foraged in areas of bare ground with dense understory vegetation). Cane toads in Hawai'i thrive in scattered moist patches within a severely arid matrix, despite a scarcity of flying insects, testifying to the species' ability to exploit anthropogenic disturbance