Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health

We argue that basic psychological needs theory (BPNT) offers impetus to the value of mental toughness as a mechanism for optimizing human functioning. We hypothesized that psychological needs satisfaction (thwarting) would be associated with higher (lower) levels of mental toughness, positive affect...

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Main Authors: Mahoney, J., Gucciardi, Daniel, Ntoumanis, N., Mallett, C.
Format: Journal Article
Published: Human Kinetics 2014
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/16716
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author Mahoney, J.
Gucciardi, Daniel
Ntoumanis, N.
Mallett, C.
author_facet Mahoney, J.
Gucciardi, Daniel
Ntoumanis, N.
Mallett, C.
author_sort Mahoney, J.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description We argue that basic psychological needs theory (BPNT) offers impetus to the value of mental toughness as a mechanism for optimizing human functioning. We hypothesized that psychological needs satisfaction (thwarting) would be associated with higher (lower) levels of mental toughness, positive affect, and performance and lower (higher) levels of negative affect. We also expected that mental toughness would be associated with higher levels of positive affect and performance and lower levels of negative affect. Further, we predicted that coaching environments would be related to mental toughness indirectly through psychological needs and those psychological needs would indirectly relate with performance and affect through mental toughness. Adolescent cross-country runners (136 male and 85 female, Mage = 14.36) completed questionnaires pertaining to BPNT variables, mental toughness, and affect. Race times were also collected. Our findings supported our hypotheses. We concluded that BPNT is generative in understanding some of the antecedents and consequences of mental toughness and is a novel framework useful for understanding mental toughness.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-167162017-09-13T15:44:55Z Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health Mahoney, J. Gucciardi, Daniel Ntoumanis, N. Mallett, C. human functioning coach environments Autonomy positive youth development We argue that basic psychological needs theory (BPNT) offers impetus to the value of mental toughness as a mechanism for optimizing human functioning. We hypothesized that psychological needs satisfaction (thwarting) would be associated with higher (lower) levels of mental toughness, positive affect, and performance and lower (higher) levels of negative affect. We also expected that mental toughness would be associated with higher levels of positive affect and performance and lower levels of negative affect. Further, we predicted that coaching environments would be related to mental toughness indirectly through psychological needs and those psychological needs would indirectly relate with performance and affect through mental toughness. Adolescent cross-country runners (136 male and 85 female, Mage = 14.36) completed questionnaires pertaining to BPNT variables, mental toughness, and affect. Race times were also collected. Our findings supported our hypotheses. We concluded that BPNT is generative in understanding some of the antecedents and consequences of mental toughness and is a novel framework useful for understanding mental toughness. 2014 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/16716 10.1123/jsep.2013-0260 Human Kinetics fulltext
spellingShingle human functioning
coach environments
Autonomy
positive youth development
Mahoney, J.
Gucciardi, Daniel
Ntoumanis, N.
Mallett, C.
Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title_full Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title_fullStr Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title_full_unstemmed Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title_short Mental toughness in sport: Motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
title_sort mental toughness in sport: motivational antecedents and associations with performance and psychological health
topic human functioning
coach environments
Autonomy
positive youth development
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/16716