Athletes' Self and Metaperceptions of The Coach-Athlete Relationship And Its Impact on Athletes

Hannah K. Woodske, The College of Wooster

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to examine the relationships amongst various perceptions of athletes. Specifically, it was hypothesized that a positively perceived coach-athlete relationship would be positively correlated with high self-efficacy, motivation, satisfaction, and relational inferred self-efficacy (RISE). Additionally, the final hypothesis dealt specifically with the constructs of self-efficacy and RISE, predicting that scores on RISE would be positively correlated with high self-efficacy. A total of 118 student-athletes participated in the study by completing a 116-item survey. The data were analyzed with Pearson's r correlations to examine the interrelationships among the athletes' perceptions of the coach-athlete relationship, their self-efficacy, motivation, satisfaction, and RISE scores. The results of this study supported four of the five hypotheses such that a positively perceived coach-athlete relationship was significantly positively correlated with high self-efficacy, satisfaction, and RISE. In addition, the strong positive correlation between RISE and self-efficacy was even stronger than the correlation between the coach-athlete responses and self-efficacy, suggesting the importance of metacognitions about the coach-athlete relationship in athletes' sense of competence, motivation, and satisfaction in the performance of their sport.