Efforts have been made to understand more about the psychological characteristics that differentiate between more and less successful athletes, but little research exists examining the relationships between specific coping strategies and performance. The purpose of this investigation was to examine how athletes cope with stress and how their coping strategies influence their performance. One hundred and forty eight collegiate softball players from 13 teams competing across the Southeastern United States participated in this investigation. They completed the COPE, a questionnaire designed to assess various coping strategies, the Sport Anxiety Scale, a measure of trait anxiety, and a demographic questionnaire. Their coaches also completed a demographic questionnaire assessing each athlete's coping ability, the impact it had on her performance, and the effort it took her to cope. Results revealed that athletes used a wide variety of coping skills to deal with the stress of sports. Specifically, subjects reported greater use of adaptive and emotion-focused strategies than maladaptive or problem-focused coping strategies. In addition, high trait anxiety levels were related to the type of coping strategy selected
