Search results for "athletic identity"
showing 8 items of 8 documents
Restoring Harmony in the Lifeworld? : Identity, Learning, and Leaving Preelite Sport
2020
Sport provides many youth participants with a central life project, and yet very few eventually fulfill their athletic dreams, which may lead them to disengage from sport entirely. Many studies have explored the processes of athletic retirement, but little is known about how youth athletes actually reconstruct their relationship with sport and embodiment postretirement. The authors explored these issues in the story of “Pilvi,” a Finnish alpine skier who disengaged from sport in her late adolescence. Employing an existential-phenomenological approach, they conducted six low-structured interviews with Pilvi, combined with visual methods, and identified key themes relating to the body, space,…
“She is where I’d want to be in my career” : Youth athletes’ role models and their implications for career and identity construction
2019
Abstract Objectives While role models have been documented to play a vital role in adolescents’ career development and identity exploration, in sport psychology they remain an untapped resource. The present study drew on narrative inquiry to explore the patterns of role model selection by adolescent student-athletes and the narrative maps these role models provide for self-construction. As a second objective, the study sought to understand the impact of gender on the selection and meaning of role models. Method Eighteen Finnish student-athletes (10 women, eight men) aged 17-18 participated in conversational interviews. We analysed the data with thematic and structural narrative analyses. Re…
Urheilija vai opiskelija? : urheilulukiolaisten identiteettiprofiilit
2018
Tutkimuksessa lukioikäisten nuorten kykyä yhdistää opinnot ja urheilu tarkasteltiin identiteetin näkökulmasta. Erityisesti oltiin kiinnostuneita siitä, millaisia identiteettiprofiileja nuorilla urheilijoilla on havaittavissa lukion alussa sekä miten sukupuoli, urheilulaji sekä urheilu- ja opintomenestys selittävät näitä profiileja. Tutkimus on osa ”Finnish Longitudinal Dual Career Study” -tutkimushanketta, jossa seurataan urheilulukiossa opiskelevien nuorten psykososiaalista kehitystä ja akateemista suuntautumista lukiovuosien aikana urheiluun liittyvän urakehityksen rinnalla (Ryba ym. 2016). Syksyllä 2015 suoritettuun kyselytutkimukseen osallistui 391 urheilulukion ensimmäisellä luokalla o…
A collective case study of athletic identity and successful injury rehabilitation
2015
A severe injury is an identity threatening situation for competitive athletes. Previous literature suggests that having a strong athletic identity can be beneficial for the athlete when injured. To the date there has been little research on how athletic identity is managed during that challenging time of injury. The purpose of this study was to explore how athletic identity is managed during the injury and rehabilitation phase before returning to competitive sport. Knowing the determinants of athletic identity management allows practitioners to adjust their interventions toward specific issues when working with injured athletes. The present study is a qualitative, collective case study. Her…
The Quantified Athlete: Associations of Wearables for High School Athletes
2018
The adoption of wearable technology in competitive sports can be an advantage to performance and training. Athletes who use personalised data to quantify their performances with the possibilities of sharing with others may use wearables to reinforce the athletic identity. Despite these changes, few studies have actually examined the associations between wearables and developing athletes in their quest for professional sports. Student athletes (n = 437, age = 17y) still in high schools completed a web-based survey about their professional aspirations, athletic identity, and the association with wearables. Wearables were measured by ownership and usage of apps, fitness trackers, or sports wat…
‘Don’t ever mix God with sports’: Christian religion in athletes’ stories of life transitions
2019
Sport psychology researchers have increasingly recognized the need to adopt a holistic perspective when seeking to understand athletes’ adaptation to life transitions. The present study sought to understand how religion influences athletes’ journeys in sport and experiences of life transitions. Two Christian elite athletes participated in life story interviews which we analyzed via narrative analysis. Although the participants narratively separated religious belief from sport, religion, as a source of basic world assumptions and values, provided a broader framework of meaning and continuity in their sport lives. Yet, both stories involved a growing distance to institutional religious practi…
Developing narrative identities in youth pre-elite sport : bridging the present and the future
2019
Narrative research has contributed to understandings of athletic identity as an evolving story of the self that is creatively put together by the agentic individual but necessarily dependent on broader narratives within which we all live our lives. However, most studies in sport have focused on retrospective ‘big stories’ of athletes’ lives, rather than on-going, future-oriented identity construction through storytelling. In this study, we explored Finnish pre-elite athletes’ emerging stories of the self to understand the processes associated with the narrative selection and the resources they tap into in making sport meaningful to them. Nine women and eight men aged 17–18 were invited to c…
Predictive Variables of Adolescents' Intention to Be Physically Active after Graduation. Is Gender a Conditioning Factor?
2020
The acquisition of physical activity habits during adolescence is fundamental to guarantee its adherence throughout life. However, these levels decrease during this stage, with women experimenting a more significant decrease. This paper aims to analyze if there are significant differences in the variables related to the intention to be physically active between men and women and if there is a moderating effect of gender on the variables that predict this intention. The sample is composed of 256 adolescents, aged between 16 and 19 years, 55.50% of whom are men, and 44.50% women. The results show that there are statistically significant differences (p <