ASSOCIATION OF COACH, PEER, AND PARENT-INITIATED MOTIVATIONAL CLIMATE WITH BURNOUT AND ENGAGEMENT

ECU Author/Contributor (non-ECU co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)

Jordan Barbee (Creator)

Institution

East Carolina University (ECU )

Web Site: http://www.ecu.edu/lib/

Abstract: Sport participation can be an engaging experience and result in health benefits, skill development, and social camaraderie. However, it can also result in negative outcomes such as burnout. Burnout is negatively associated with sport engagement and the quality of athlete experiences. It also contributes to the reasons why athletes discontinue sport and negatively impacts their well-being. Research has shown that burnout and engagement are potentially influenced by social agents (e.g. parents, peers, and coaches) such as through the motivational climate they create. A mastery climate is one in which success is defined in terms of selfreferenced standards of excellence with a focus on improvement, mistakes being viewed as a part of learning, and effort. Within a performance climate, success is defined in terms of social comparison and outperforming others. This can result in intra-team rivalries and conflict. Although research has shown that the motivational climate created by social agents impacts athletes sport experiences, few studies have examined whether the climate created by coaches, parents, or peers has the strongest association with burnout and engagement. Therefore, the first purpose of this study was to examine the relationship of the motivational climate created by coaches, parents, and peers with engagement and burnout. The second purpose was to determine which social agent is the strongest predictor of athlete engagement and burnout. Following student activities coordinator and coach approval, 150 high school athletes completed surveys on athlete engagement and burnout, along with surveys assessing athlete perceptions of the motivational climate created by coaches, parents, and peers. Correlational analyses were used to examine the relationship of athlete engagement and burnout with motivational climate while regression analyses were used to determine which social agent's motivational climate had the strongest association with burnout and engagement. Overall, a mastery climate created by coaches and peers had significant (p[less-than]0.05), small to moderate relationships with the devaluation and reduced sense of accomplishment dimension of burnout (i.e., r = -.22 to -.44), and engagement (i.e., r = .21 to .37). A parent mastery climate was found to be unrelated to burnout and had small, significant relationships with engagement (i.e., r = .21 to .27). The relationship between performance climates created by the social agents with burnout and engagement were smaller in magnitude compared to the mastery climates (r= -.10 to .19). When all three social agents were examined together, the motivational climates collectively explained 13.3% of the variance for overall burnout and 29.3% of the variance for overall engagement. When examining individual subscales, the most variance in burnout was reduced accomplishment (r2 = 0.26), followed by devaluation (r2= 0.13) and exhaustion (r2 = 0.06). For engagement each subscale was similar to overall engagement (r2= 0.20 to r2= 0.23). It was found that the mastery climates created by coaches and peers predicted lower burnout scores whereas the climate created by parents was not a significant predictor. Mastery climates created by all three social agents were predictive (p[less-than]0.05) of higher engagement with peers having stronger associations compared to coaches and parents. The extent to which parents and peers created a performance climate was unrelated to burnout or engagement. Contrary to predictions, a coach created performance climate was linked to higher engagement, but the relationship was small in magnitude (partial r= 0.18). Overall, when high school athletes perceived that their coaches and peers created a mastery climate, they reported higher engagement and lower burnout. A mastery climate in which success is defined by on effort, learning, and improvement should be created by coaches, parents and peers for athletes to experience high engagement and low burnout.

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Language: English

Date: 2020

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