Les athlètes adolescents et la communauté sportive : le sens psychologique communautaire appliqué au sport

The Sense of Community is important for the well-being and positive social development of adolescents (Pretty, 2002; Cicognani et al., 2006, 2012). However, a few studies have provided significant information on the mechanisms that can lead to the construction of a community in sport (Warner, 2011). The objective of this thesis is to contribute to the definition of a sport community, examining the mechanisms underlying the formation of Sense Community in sport contexts in adolescence. For this, the first chapter presents a review of literature about Sense of Community and the second chapter examines the literature on the Sense of Community in Sport and sports participation in adolescence. Subsequently two lines of research are proposed. The first line consists of two qualitative studies. The results of these studies revealed that the sport community includes in particular parents, peers and coach sports. There emerges a challenge for these young athletes to maintain relationships with nonathlete peers. The second line comprises two quantitative studies. The first study focused on the validation of the questionnaire Adolescents Sense Community in Sport (SCSA), in French and Italian. The second study focused on understanding the processes of SCSA and its relationship with parents, coach, peer non-athletes climate perceived and sport involvement. The results showed that during adolescence, the SCSA significantly influences the commitment, and the relationship between peer non-athletes climate perceived and sporting commitment is mediated by SCSALe Sens Communautaire est important pour le bien-être et le développement social positif des adolescents (Pretty, 2002 ; Cicognani et al., 2006; 2012). Cependant, peu d'études ont fourni des informations significatives sur les mécanismes qui peuvent conduire à la construction d'une communauté dans le sport (Warner, 2011). L'objectif de cette thèse est de contribuer à la définition d'une communauté sportive, en examinant les mécanismes sous-jacents à la formation d'un Sens Communautaire dans des contextes sportifs à l'adolescence. Pour cela, un premier chapitre présente une revue de littérature sur le Sens Communautaire et un deuxième chapitre examine la littérature sur le sens communautaire sportif, et la participation sportive à l'adolescence. Par la suite deux axes de recherches sont proposés. Le premier axe comprend deux études qualitatives. Les résultats de ces études ont révélé que la communauté sportive comprend en particulier, les parents, l'entraineur et les pairs sportifs. Il émerge une difficulté pour ces jeunes athlètes à maintenir des relations avec des pairs non sportifs. Le deuxième axe comprend deux études quantitatives. La première étude a porté sur la validation du questionnaire du Sens Communautaire Sportif à l'Adolescence (SCSA), en langue française et italienne. La seconde étude a porté sur la compréhension des processus de ce SCSA en mettant en évidence ses relations avec le climat perçu des parents, de l'entraineur, des pairs non-sportifs, et de l'engagement sportif. Les résultats ont montré qu'à l'adolescence, le SCSA influence de manière significative l'engagement, et que la relation entre le climat perçu des pairs non-sportifs et l'engagement sportif est médié par le SCS

Groups participation and action in a local context

This work pertains to the research about young participation to community life. According to preview literature, participation is been often defined as collective action, whose purpose is to improve social status, power and influence of a whole group, rather than few people (Tajfel & Turner, 1978). Participation is very close to the concept of empowerment, being its determinant but also its effect. Participation often brings about an increase of psychological empowerment, because people become trustful to have a collective influence (Zimmermann, 1990). Thanks to organizations, those are intermediate facilities among citizens and institutions; it's possible to gain role patterns and skill to influence social environment, those are impossible to gain by oneself. Besides participation promotes the awareness of interdependence among individuals, that encourages a virtuose circle of belonging to more inclusive groups. So the collective choice should be strengthened, as long as wider and superordinate collectivities come to replace the preview ones. One of the expressions of participation is emotional climate that concerns the relationship inside a group, and between the in-group and the out-group. Emotional climate is defined as the foremost emotional state that is quite steady during the time, and characterizes a social context, relating to underneath political and social functioning (de Rivera, 1992). Emotional climate, according to participants' tale, provides us an idea of the type of group, and the type of identification. Instead the emotional climates in the meetings with other groups, the trustful relationships, give us information about inclusiveness of the groups, and their flexible boundaries. In an unsafely climate, where distrust in the other individuals is widespread, a competitive attitude is more likely than a cooperative one, preventing a supportive interdependence. The civic and political organizations, even though they are unofficial, deserve to provide citizens with a useful way to overcome individualistic logic and to strive for collectivism. They allow them to cope with individual costs thanks to identification's experience, in both cognitive and emotional dimension. While chances to socialize with a group increase, the identification is promoted, so that the individual benefit becomes more and more similar to a collective, and the own ideals to the group (De Cremer et al., 2008). The social change becomes a principal objective, an ideal more and more internalized by active members of the group. On the other side, to be involved in group activities, even though the group has officially political and social objectives, doesn't mean necessarily to be included in an wider community, and doesn't entail a representation of an own group as a flowing and opened system. The paradoxal effects of participation are noticed as disempowerment (Rich et al., 1995), the suppression of minorities, inconsistent and undemocratic decisions making process, and the increase of chaos and conflicts. These effects are partially determined by in-group bias, those are well-known by the social psychology.The aim of this research was the exploration of reciprocal dynamics among local context, in an Italian city (Naples). In these dynamics, we include participation climate and individual empowerment in young people who are involved in different social groups. In particular, the aim was to explore the relationship between participants and groups, and how they promote their collective action in that community. For this purpose we considered the experiences in the group, the skills developed and their use in the local community. The participants were 45 young people with an average age of 23.30 years (range 18- 25 years). They live in Naples and in its surrounding province. 70% are university students and 30% of them are workers, 50% women and the remaining men. We used a type of theoretical sampling, or step by step sampling (Morse, 2003). The participants are members of formal groups: 13 of sport, 12 of cultural, 10 of religious and 10 of political groups. These groups have a mission to promote changes in their social context and cultural society, in fact they are involved to set up relationships of mutual collaboration in their community. The instrument used for data collection was the semi-structured interview about these subjects: group’s representation, sense of belonging, group emotional climate, relations with the local community. The interviews were audio recorded, with the consent of the participants. Each interview has an average duration of approximately one hour. We used Grounded theory methodology to analyze the interviews to explain some aspects of the phenomenal. We are supported by the software Atlas.ti, that helped us to organize dat

Bio-Cooperative Approach for the Human-in-the-Loop Control of an End-Effector Rehabilitation Robot

The design of patient-tailored rehabilitative protocols represents one of the crucial factors that influence motor recovery mechanisms, such as neuroplasticity. This approach, including the patient in the control loop and characterized by a control strategy adaptable to the user's requirements, is expected to significantly improve functional recovery in robot-aided rehabilitation. In this paper, a novel 3D bio-cooperative robotic platform is developed. A new arm-weight support system is included into an operational robotic platform for 3D upper limb robot-aided rehabilitation. The robotic platform is capable of adapting therapy characteristics to specific patient needs, thanks to biomechanical and physiological measurements, and thus closing the subject in the control loop. The level of arm-weight support and the level of the assistance provided by the end-effector robot are varied on the basis of muscular fatigue and biomechanical indicators. An assistance-as-needed approach is applied to provide the appropriate amount of assistance. The proposed platform has been experimentally validated on 10 healthy subjects; they performed 3D point-to-point tasks in two different conditions, i.e., with and without assistance-as-needed. The results have demonstrated the capability of the proposed system to properly adapt to real needs of the patients. Moreover, the provided assistance was shown to reduce the muscular fatigue without negatively influencing motion execution

Acute Delta Hepatitis in Italy spanning three decades (1991–2019): Evidence for the effectiveness of the hepatitis B vaccination campaign

Updated incidence data of acute Delta virus hepatitis (HDV) are lacking worldwide. Our aim was to evaluate incidence of and risk factors for acute HDV in Italy after the introduction of the compulsory vaccination against hepatitis B virus (HBV) in 1991. Data were obtained from the National Surveillance System of acute viral hepatitis (SEIEVA). Independent predictors of HDV were assessed by logistic-regression analysis. The incidence of acute HDV per 1-million population declined from 3.2 cases in 1987 to 0.04 in 2019, parallel to that of acute HBV per 100,000 from 10.0 to 0.39 cases during the same period. The median age of cases increased from 27 years in the decade 1991-1999 to 44 years in the decade 2010-2019 (p < .001). Over the same period, the male/female ratio decreased from 3.8 to 2.1, the proportion of coinfections increased from 55% to 75% (p = .003) and that of HBsAg positive acute hepatitis tested for by IgM anti-HDV linearly decreased from 50.1% to 34.1% (p < .001). People born abroad accounted for 24.6% of cases in 2004-2010 and 32.1% in 2011-2019. In the period 2010-2019, risky sexual behaviour (O.R. 4.2; 95%CI: 1.4-12.8) was the sole independent predictor of acute HDV; conversely intravenous drug use was no longer associated (O.R. 1.25; 95%CI: 0.15-10.22) with this. In conclusion, HBV vaccination was an effective measure to control acute HDV. Intravenous drug use is no longer an efficient mode of HDV spread. Testing for IgM-anti HDV is a grey area requiring alert. Acute HDV in foreigners should be monitored in the years to come

Atleti adolescenti e comunità sportiva: il senso psicologico di comunità applicato allo sport

Il Senso di Comunità costituisce un fattore importante per il benessere e lo sviluppo sociale positivo degli adolescenti (Pretty, 2002 ; Cicognani et al., 2006; 2012). Tuttavia, pochi studi hanno fornito informazioni significative sui meccanismi che possono condurre alla costruzione di una Comunità nello sport (Warner & Dixon, 2011). Finalità generale di questa tesi è di contribuire alla definizione di una Comunità Sportiva, esaminando i meccanismi alla base della formazione del Senso di Comunità applicato allo Sport in Adolescenza. A tal fine sono stati condotti tre studi. Dal primo studio, condotto attraverso un approccio qualitativo, emerge che lo sport a livello agonistico in adolescenza contribuisce a creare una dimensione progettuale, e che gli atleti adolescenti percepiscono difficoltà a relazionarsi con i pari non atleti. Dal secondo studio, condotto attraverso un approccio qualitativo, emerge che la Comunità Sportiva per gli adolescenti intervistati comprende, in particolare, i genitori, l’allenatore e il gruppo dei pari – atleti. Il terzo studio, condotto attraverso un approccio quantitativo, è composto da due fasi. La prima fase ha portato alla costruzione e validazione del Questionario del Senso di Comunità Sportivo in Adolescenza (SCS-A) in lingua italiana e in lingua francese. La seconda fase ha portato alla comprensione del processo di costruzione del SCS - A, evidenziando le sue relazioni con le seguenti variabili : clima percepito dei genitori, dell’allenatore, dei pari non – sportivi e impegno sportivo. I risultati mostrano che in adolescenza il SCS influenza in maniera significativa l’impegno sportivo e che la relazione tra il clima percepito dei pari – non sportivi e l’impegno sportivo è mediata dal SCS – A