Research and Practice in Talent Identification and Development - Some Thoughts on the State of Play

Although there has been considerable growth in talent identification and development research, the mixed quality and lack of applied focus means little has changed in the field. We propose the Performance-Outcome-Process continuum, a structure which examines ideas based on what and how they contribute to the talent development process. Reflecting a pracademic focus we highlight the importance of understanding the processes and mechanisms of development-focused constructs to best bridge the research-practice divide. We suggest a pragmatic approach that prioritises the quality of research and the importance of applied impact; at least in research which claims to be for sport. Lay Summary: To bridge the research-practice divide in Talent Identification and Development, it is important that translational and pragmatic research becomes the norm, with progression from the retrospective studies which have been typical in this domain. Focusing on the processes and mechanisms that generate comprehensive development would seem a logical step especially for investigations that want to make a difference in applied settings

Sports Participation and Juvenile Delinquency: A Meta-Analytic Review

Participation in sports activities is very popular among adolescents, and is frequently encouraged among youth. Many psychosocial health benefits in youth are attributed to sports participation, but to what extent this positive influence holds for juvenile delinquency is still not clear on both the theoretical and empirical level. There is much controversy on whether sports participation should be perceived as a protective or a risk factor for the development of juvenile delinquency. A multilevel meta-analysis of 51 published and unpublished studies, with 48 independent samples containing 431 effect sizes and N = 132,366 adolescents, was conducted to examine the relationship between sports participation and juvenile delinquency and possible moderating factors of this association. The results showed that there is no overall significant association between sports participation and juvenile delinquency, indicating that adolescent athletes are neither more nor less delinquent than non-athletes. Some study, sample and sports characteristics significantly moderated the relationship between sports participation and juvenile delinquency. However, this moderating influence was modest. Implications for theory and practice concerning the use of sports to prevent juvenile delinquency are discussed. Keywords Sports participation Juvenile delinquency Multilevel meta-analysis Revie

Preface to the Special Issue: 50 years of FEPSAC

The 50th anniversary of FEPSAC is a milestone in a vivid history of sport and exercise psychology in Europe. FEPSAC is the acronym for Fédération Européenne de Psychologie des Sports et des Activités Corporelles which translated from French means European Federation of Sport Psychology and Physical Activity. FEPSAC’s main aim is to support the development of sport and exercise psychology in Europe by 1) promoting scientific, educational and professional work 2) disseminating information and promoting co-operation and by 3) maintaining social and scientific relations between persons and groups working in sport and exercise psychology, mainly in Europe. In order to achieve these aims FEPSAC organizes a congress every four (as of 2022 every two) years, publishes the journal Psychology of Sport and Exercise, position statements and takes the initiative for the publication of books. FEPSAC has its own website (www.fepsac.eu) as well as social media presences on facebook, twitter and Linkedin. The organisation is altruistic and strives to achieve non-profit goals of international value. FEPSAC consists of group members (associations of sport psychology) and individual members. FEPSAC is run by a Managing Council which is elected every four years

Preface to the special issue: 50 years of FEPSAC

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Nonverbal post-shot celebrations and their relationship with performance in elite handball

Nonverbal behaviour has an important function in team sports, but research is limited. Adopting a psychological momentum (PM) framework, this study explores the relationship between a team’s history of events, nonverbal post-shot celebrations in the form of gestures and touch shown by the shooter after scoring, and subsequent team performance during handball matches. A naturalistic design with systematic observation was chosen for the present study. Based on an existing coding scheme, 616 post-shot periods from 18 high-stake matches of the highest league in Sweden were analysed. Results showed that the better a team’s prior performance, the more gestures were displayed after scoring in the following period. A high degree of touch when playing well, and a low degree of touch when playing poorly were related to positive subsequent team performance, while, showing much touch when playing poorly, or showing little touch when playing well were related to negative subsequent team performance. The amount of displayed gesture and touch alone was not significantly related to subsequent team performance. To conclude, nonverbal post-shot celebrations were related to subsequent team performance, but only when the ongoing history of events was taken into account, and only for touch. Based on these results, the history of events emerges as an important variable when the dynamics of ongoing team sport matches are investigated. Furthermore, touch, compared to gesture, seems to be of more importance for subsequent team performance. As expected when investigating complex phenomena in ongoing matches, the findings resulted in small effect sizes

A novel high channel-count system for acute multi-site neuronal recordings

Multisite recording represents a suitable condition to study microphysiology and network, interactions in the central nervous system and; therefore, to understand brain functions. Several different materials and array configurations have been proposed for the development of new probes utilized to record brain activity from experimental animal models. We describe new multisite silicon probes that broaden the currently available application base for neuroscientists. The array arrangement of the probes recording sites was extended to increase their spatial resolution. Probes were integrated with a newly developed electronic hardware and novel software for advanced real-time processing and analysis. The new system, based on 32- and 64-electrode silicon probes, proved very valuable to record field potentials and single unit activity from the olfactory-limbic cortex of the in vitro isolated guinea-pig brain preparation and to acutely record unit activity at multiple sites from the cerebellar cortex in vivo. The potential advantages of the new system in comparison to the currently available technology are discussed