The Relationship Among Athlete Leadership Behaviors and Cohesion in Team Sports

This study examined the influence of athlete leadership behaviors on perceptions of team cohesion. The participants were 312 athletes from 25 varsity and club level teams. Each participant completed the Group Environment Questionnaire (Carron, Widmeyer, & Brawley, 1985) that assessed cohesion and the Leadership Scale for Sports (Chelladurai & Saleh, 1980) that assessed athlete leadership behaviors. Overall, it was found that individual perceptions of Training and Instruction, and Social Support positively influenced all four dimensions of cohesion (ATG-T, ATG-S, GI–T, GI-S). Furthermore, Autocratic Behavior was negatively associated with the four dimensions of cohesion. Finally, Democratic Behavior was positively related to ATG-T. These findings provide researchers, sport psychology consultants, athletes, and coaches with some initial evidence that it is important to foster the development of athlete leader behaviors to influence the team environment

An Examination of Travel Effects on Performance Outcomes in Major League Soccer

The home advantage (HA) is a well-documented phenomenon across team sports, including association football (soccer). The effects of travel play a role in the HA, although the nature in which travel affects performance is still unknown. Match data from Major League Soccer (MLS) were used to investigate the role that crowd factors, travel, and team quality play in the HA. The results demonstrated the negative effect of a connecting flight by the visiting team on match outcomes. Also, in comparison to drawn matches, home team wins and losses increased when traveling east