About every tenth young elite athlete reported burnout or depressive symptoms of potential clinical relevance. While high perceived stress was associated with increased psychological health complaints, mental toughness was able to off-set some of the negative consequences resulting from high stress exposure.

By identifying 2 boundary conditions, this study revealed important insights in explaining when PA-promoting messages will be effective to predict objective MVPA and when they will not.

This file was dowloaded from the institutional repository Brage NIH -brage.bibsys.no/nih Isoard-Gautheur, S., Guillet-Descas, E., Lemyre, N. (2012). A prospective study of the influence of perceived coaching style on burnout propensity in high level young athletes: using a self-determination theory perspective. The Sport psychologist, 26, 282-298. 282The Sport Psychologist, 2012Psychologist, , 26, 282-298 © 2012 Human Kinetics, Inc.Isoard-Gautheur and Guillet-Descas are with the Faculty of Sport and Physical Activity Sciences, University of Lyon 1, Villeurbanne, France. Lemyre is with the Norwegian University of Sport Science, Oslo, Norway. A Prospective Study of the Influence of Perceived Coaching Style on Burnout Propensity in High Level Young Athletes: Using a Self-Determination Theory Perspective Sandrine Isoard-Gautheur and Emma Guillet-DescasUniversity of Lyon Pierre-Nicolas LemyreNorwegian University of Sport Science Elite Training CentersThe ability to cope with the demands of excelling in both sport and academia, and with the pressure put on athletes by their coach and parents; is an important success factor for adolescents in elite training centers. In a French survey (i.e., Observatoire régional de la santé, 1996) elite adolescent student-athletes reported lower levels of subjective well-being than other adolescents because they often lacked the necessary psychosocial support. In the context of elite level youth sport, many studies have highlighted the importance of motivational factors. They have also shown that there is an important risk for young elite competitors to lose their motivation, to overreach, and to feel exhausted by their sports life. Due to a total devotion to their goals, unfulfillment of basic psychological needs, excessive training, insufficient recovery and perceived insufficient psychosocial support, the athletes are unable to reach their full athletic potential (Lemyre, Roberts & Stray-Gundersen, 2007). Even though there have been many studies on the motivational antecedents of maladaptive sport participation outcomes such as athlete burnout, these have only looked at a very limited number of motivational factors (e.g., Cresswell & Eklund, 2005. Thus the purpose of this study is to further investigate motivational antecedents (i.e., coaching style, fundamental psychological needs, and self-determined regulations, based on self-determination theory; Deci & Ryan, 2000) of athlete burnout using a prospective six-month-follow-up. Perceived Coaching Style Influence on Burnout in Young Athletes 283Self-Determination Theory Self-Determination Theory (SDT;Deci & Ryan, 2000) is a theoretical approach that could explain the implications of the social environment (lack of psychosocial support in sport) on the well-being of young athletes. This theoretical framework suggests two distinct styles of coaching, leading to qualitatively different outcomes. A coach is deemed "controlling" when he/she is perceived as authoritarian and coercive and when athletes do not feel autonomous toward makin...