IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

It has been argued that the heart of sports and exercise psychology research lies in its implications for practice (Lyle, 1999). The literatures on coach-athlete

relationships have also highlighted that there is a gap between the scientific research and its real impact upon coaches, athletes and practitioners (Coppel, 1995;

Poczwardowski, 1997). The present thesis aimed to conduct research that has significant implications for practice, therefore, the findings of this thesis can be transferred into practice to help coaches and athletes have better performance accomplishments and healthier psychological well-being.

The findings of the current thesis highlight several aspects that could potentially be used by practitioners in an attempt to help coaches and athlete establish and maintain a harmonious and effective relationship. First, the proof of the cross-cultural validity of the 11-item CART-Q in different countries supplies confidence to practitioners to use this questionnaire with a squad or team which involves multi-cultural elements. As it has emphasised several times throughout this thesis that with the globalization of sports and society, sports psychology practitioners are confronted with the challenges that working with clients of cultures different from their own. In addition, researchers (e.g., Danish, Petipas, & Hale, 1993; Duda & Allison, 1990) have reached the

consensus that there is no universal approach in applied sports psychology, but so far there is very limited understanding and knowledge regarding the diversified

approaches to working with clients from different cultures. Therefore, the large amount of work carried out in validating different versions of the CART-Q and developing indigenous psychometric scales may play an instrumental role in terms of providing tools and resources for practitioners to overcome these challenges.

Second, the findings generated from study 1 revealed that the intensity of the athlete’s perceptions regarding closeness and commitment varied significantly across different countries. This information may help facilitate practitioners’ understanding in terms of how cultural diversities influence the cognitive similarities and differences of coaches’ and athletes’ psychological process towards their coach-athlete

relationships. For example, if psychology consultants work with athletes and coaches from typical collectivistic countries, such as Greece and China, they may need to be aware that athletes and coaches from these countries tend to have a stronger emotional bond and relationship with each other (see Triandis, 1995). This reflects their

perceptions regarding the constructs of closeness and commitment, as Greek and Chinese scored significantly higher than that of the individualists. In contrast, athletes and coaches from such countries as Britain and Belgium seem to appreciate more respect for their privacy (e.g., life outside sports) and prefer to have a certain distance from their coach and athlete (see Hofstede, 1980). Such assertion may help explain why athletes from individualistic countries scored much lower on closeness and commitment relative to Chinese and Greek in study 1. Overall, the knowledge derived from the empirical study has significant preventative implications by offering

resources for sport psychology consultants.

Third, the development of the Dominant-Submissive Behaviour Scale may help practitioners better understand and identify the strength and weakness of the

relationship through comparing the level of congruence between the coach’s dominant behaviours and the athlete’s submissive behaviours. In other words, the reciprocity of the coach-athlete complementarity decides that the coach is the one who dominates the athletic partnership, and thus the athlete is expected to demonstrate a certain level of submissiveness to his/her coach’s instructions and lead. In this sense, if the

mechanism of such reciprocal interactions does not follow the pattern (i.e., coach/dominance-athlete/submissive) as it is supposed to be, then relationship conflicts may occur. For instance, if the coach tends to be very dominant towards his/her athlete, but the athlete does not demonstrate a corresponding level of submissiveness to follow and execute the coach’s order. Hence, the level of

congruence between the coach’s dominant behaviours and the athlete’s submissive behaviours is not balanced. Therefore, employing the Dominant-Submissive

Behaviour Scale could uncover those potential cues which might be responsible for the relationship conflicts. Subsequently, a corresponding intervention maybe developed and implemented to help optimize the functioning of this athletic partnership.

Another major contribution this thesis makes to the practice relates to the findings generated from the dyadic study (see study 3) regarding the influences of personality traits on the quality of coach-athlete relationships. It has become more popular that

sports clubs tend to ask the new member/athlete to complete a personality assessment before they are assigned to a specific coach. However, there is a lack of empirical findings in sports psychology literature regarding how personality actually impacts upon the effectiveness of coaching and the quality of coach-athlete relationships. In this aspect, findings offer important theoretical knowledge for practitioners to consider in practice. For instance, it was found that within Chinese sports context, there were partner effects of athletes’ personality on coaches’ perceptions of relationship quality. Based upon such information, consultants can help coaches recognise that their perceptions of coach-athlete relationships are influenced by their athletes’ personality traits. Therefore, they are likely to have preferences for one athlete over another especially when they face a group of athletes. However,

consultants may also need to emphasis that their preferences can be perceived by their athletes via meta-perceptions, which could raise the potential relationship conflicts, or even impact upon their athletes’ psychological well-being, and such issue is often appeared in youth sports context (see Gould, et al., 2007).

Furthermore, another noteworthy finding which could have significant implication for practice is that conscientiousness was found as the most influential personality trait in determining the quality of coach-athlete relationships. Correspondingly, an intervention programme can be developed to target coaches’ and athletes’ awareness of being self-disciplined, organized and working hard in their athletic partnership. In summary, this thesis offers a wide range of knowledge from a cross-cultural

perspective to help practitioners ensure that the quality of coach-athlete relationships coaches and athletes experience is maintained in a healthy and effective manner.