Understanding the Development of Elite Parasport Athletes Using a Constraint-Led Approach: Considerations for Coaches and Practitioners

Abstract

For the past half-century, the Paralympic Games has continued to grow, evident through increased participation, media recognition, and rising research focus in Para sport. While the competitive pool of athletes has increased, athlete development models have stayed relatively the same. Currently, coaches rely mainly on experiential knowledge, informal communication with colleagues, and theory transferred from able-bodied contexts as main resources to support development for themselves and their athletes. The purpose of this paper was to introduce Newell's constraint-led model and its multidimensional spectrum and practical scope to address the complexities of athlete development. The model consists of three overarching constraint categories (i.e., individual, task, and environment) along with proposed additional sub-categories to capture nuances associated in Para sport in order to provide additional context to coaches regarding athlete development. Utilizing this theoretical framework, we present a holistic approach for coaches and practitioners to consider while addressing athletes' short-and longterm developmental plans. This approach highlights the interactions among factors from a wide range of categories that indirectly and directly impact one another and ultimately influence athletes' developmental processes. It is important to consider the dynamic interaction of constraints over various timescales during development and identify underlying issues to improve athlete experience and maximize developmental opportunities. Coaches and practitioners can use the proposed framework as a guide to key factors to consider for their cohort of athletes. This approach provides a context-specific approach that considers unique factors associated with athletes and their environment.

“Looking for a Golden Needle in the Haystack”: Perspectives on Talent Identification and Development in Paralympic Sport

“…HP staff perceived these attributes to be stable and/or difficult to change over time and would not be worth the expansive resources (time and energy) required by the athlete and coaches to try to position the athlete for success in a specific sport. In their proposed model, Dehghansai et al (2020a) refer to these factors as stable structural (e.g., anthropometric) and stable functional (e.g., hand-eye coordination) individual constraints which interact with other factors within athletes' environment across their development. Parallel with recommendations in this model, HP staff considered the interaction of these factors with other constraints in athletes' development and evaluated the disadvantaged position athletes may be in later in their careers competing among a more homogeneous group of athletes at the high-performance level.…”

“…He is never going to be a high-performance athlete, unfortunately. Contrastingly, situational factors such as interpersonal environmental constraints also impact athlete development (see Dehghansai et al, 2020a), but are considered malleable and can evolve; HP staff highlighted that they considered these factors during the initial selection process. For instance, coaches considered the location of athletes' residences and whether the targeted sport can support the athlete in their current circumstances (i.e., access to training centers, equipment, and/or local coaches/clubs) in order to facilitate their development.…”

“…Classification systems are a unique and evolving aspect of Paralympic sport that can facilitate or inhibit athletes' progression; coaches see it as an integral part of their role to understand the placement of an athlete within the system for athletes to succeed long-term (Radtke and Doll-Tepper, 2014;Patatas et al, 2020). Dehghansai et al (2020a) proposed a framework that considers a wide range of interconnected factors that contribute to the dynamic developmental environment. Highlighting the potential impact of this framework, insights from HP staff demonstrated the nuances associated with athletes' impairment, classifications, as well as secondary impairments and/or psychological disorders; thus, a truly individualized approach was considered for each athlete (Dehghansai et al, 2020a;Patatas et al, 2020).…”

“…Dehghansai et al (2020a) proposed a framework that considers a wide range of interconnected factors that contribute to the dynamic developmental environment. Highlighting the potential impact of this framework, insights from HP staff demonstrated the nuances associated with athletes' impairment, classifications, as well as secondary impairments and/or psychological disorders; thus, a truly individualized approach was considered for each athlete (Dehghansai et al, 2020a;Patatas et al, 2020). Impairment-related factors influence how athletes respond physiologically and whether they can execute a task based on their physical abilities.…”

“…The current assumption on overprotectiveness of parents and especially the lack of opportunities for female athletes early on in their lives, appeared to be a contributing factor to the low number of females in Paralympic sport, highlighting the importance of creating female-specific initiatives to support their early entry and to create resources for educating parents on the benefits of sport participation for their children. Last, there was a complex interaction of factors that could impact athletes' development (Dehghansai et al, 2020a), and when identifying and developing athletes, HP staff considered these stable constraints in combination with more malleable constraints that evolve across athletes' careers. Some of these malleable constraints were directly tied to opportunity-cost (i.e., athletes' current residency, available resource to support remote athletes), therefore, there is a need to identify cost-effective initiatives (e.g., partnership with local venues for accessible resources) and maximize coaching opportunities (e.g., educational resources on impairment and sport-specific nuances for development coaches and volunteers, remote-coaching) to create a more sustainable environment to support athletes in remote areas with limited resources.…”