Motivational Climate in Youth Football Players

Abstract

(1) Background: In recent decades, the psychology of sport has gained special relevance in this field, due to the influence of psychological variables on sports performance and the regularity of sports practice. The aim of this research is to analyse the motivational climate of footballers. (2) Methods: This study uses a descriptive cross-sectional design on a sample of 156 adolescent football players, using an ad-hoc questionnaire for the recording of socio-demographic variables and the PMCSQ-2 questionnaire on motivational climate in sport. (3) Results: The results of the present investigation indicate that footballers are more oriented towards task than ego, sportsmen who compete in Honor Division being the those who are more oriented towards ego and those of National Division being more oriented towards task. (4) Conclusions: The main conclusion of this research is those who are the motivational climate is related to the division in which the players compete.

Leadership and Motivational Climate: The Relationship with Objectives, Commitment, and Satisfaction in Base Soccer Players

“…The ego-oriented climate was made up of three factors which included punishment for mistakes, unequal recognition, and rivalry among team members. In previous studies, the scale showed its reliability [1] and in the present study the Cronbach alpha values were 0.88 for the task-oriented climate and 0.71 for the ego-oriented climate.…”

“…A large number of children and adolescents dedicate a significant part of their time to the practice of sports activities that are carried out in teams under the direction of a coach. Young people’s experiences, both positive and negative, with a coach’s leadership style and the team’s motivational climate can have a determining influence on their lives [1]. Fortunately, in recent years there has been increasingly more scientific research producing new contributions on leadership styles and motivational climate in team sports [2,3,4,5].…”

“…From the goal perspective theory, it is argued that the situation created by the coaches, called the motivational climate, can influence the probability of the athletes’ being involved with the ego or with the task in their sport activity [18,19]. When the motivational climate focuses on the task, the athletes’ main objective is to perform with mastery, gain skills and knowledge, put out maximum effort, and give the best of themselves [1,3,19]. Conversely, when the climate is centered on the ego, the players are concerned with their own ability and with showing that they are more competent than others [1,5,10,19,20].…”

“…When the motivational climate focuses on the task, the athletes’ main objective is to perform with mastery, gain skills and knowledge, put out maximum effort, and give the best of themselves [1,3,19]. Conversely, when the climate is centered on the ego, the players are concerned with their own ability and with showing that they are more competent than others [1,5,10,19,20]. Therefore, they believe they are successful when they think they perform better or the same as others, but with less effort.…”

Sports Elementals and Value-Added Factors in Promotion of Football in Cross River State, Nigeria

“…Motivation could be in divers form such as weekly motivation, winning bonus, match bonus, goal scoring allowance, training allowance, medical welfare, advertisement bonus, kits allowance, trophy allowance, contract allowance and vacation trip. It has been unanimously agreed that the coach's main mission is to develop the technical and tactical skills of footballers (Castro-Sanchez et al, 2018). In the last two decades, psychological factors have gained special relevance in sports field.…”