Coach’s Perception of Parent’s Attitudes in School-Age Sports

Abstract

The coach-parent relationship can significantly influence the sport participation, personal development, and sports performance of young athletes. This study aimed to investigate the coach’s perception of parent’s attitudes regarding competition attitude, the communication with the coach, and the environment during training sessions, taking into account the coaches’ sex, type of institution, or sport modality grouped into individual and collective sports. For this, a total of 159 coaches (22 females and 137 males) responded to the Questionnaire for Sports Coaches about their Opinion on the Attitudes of Fathers and Mothers in Sports (CTPMD). It analyses three factors: (1) competition attitude, (2) communication, and (3) environment. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was necessary to assess the model's goodness of fit on each factor and to calculate the Cronbach’s Alpha, the average variance extracted, and the composite reliability to analyze the instrument reliability. Descriptive and inferential analysis was performed through the Mann-Whitney U and Rosenthal r statistical tests. The results showed significant differences in the competition attitude factor regarding type of institution (U = 1964.500; p-value < 0.001; r = 0.31), in favour of public institutions. There were also significant differences in the communication factor according to the coaches’ sex (U = 1112.000; p-value = 0.04; r = 0.16), with females’ coaches perceiving worse communication with parents than male coaches. This could be relevant because it negatively influences adherence to physical activity in children and adolescents, and therefore, their health.

Impact of Basketball Match on the Pre-Competitive Anxiety and HRV of Youth Female Players

“…Moreover, the fact of training basketball in a public institution favors the results obtained. As has been shown [63], coaches think that parents whose children play sports in public institutions are more interested in their children's health and sports training than in performance. In the same line, coaches think that clubs prioritize the competition and performance.…”

“…In addition, due to the influence of parents and coaches on athletes' anxiety responses, institutions and federations are encouraged to incorporate this aspect into the formative process of coaches. Moreover, at the beginning of the season, parents should be trained in the three factors: competition attitude, communication, and environment [63]. This training will generate a positive coach-parent relationship, increasing the sports adherence of girls.…”

Determinant Factors of Achievement Motivation in School Physical Education

“…The order of the scores in the failure anxiety and stress dimension is reversed; i.e., a higher score means less anxiety and stress. This procedure has been used in the literature [ 38 ]. Therefore, 5 means the most positive value, and 1 means the most negative value in the three dimensions.…”

The Relationship between Anger Expression and Performance Score in Parents and Coaches: The Mediating Role of Self-Efficacy and Assertiveness

“…Coaches can encourage youth to take up more challenging activities as well as simplify a pleasant experience for young athletes. For these reasons, coaches have an important educational and socialization role, and parents also play an essential motivating role [ 9 ].…”