Thesis (A.B., Honors in Psychology)--Harvard University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 55-56).

Thesis (M.S.)--Miami University, Dept. of Physical Education, Health, and Sport Studies, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 64-68).

Thesis (B.A.)--Harvard University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 55-56). Also available online (PDF file) by a subscription to the set or by purchasing the individual file.

The use of concurrent Information Feedback (IF) through counting seconds verbally as the subject ran a 75 yard dash was tested. Forty-six ten and eleven year old boys and girls (boys = 20, girls = 26) were given two trials under four IF conditions: No IF; Terminal/Concurrent IF; Terminal IF; IF Removal. The counting occurred under Condition 2 and was combined with a final time given at the end of the dash. Significant main effects were found for sex and for conditions, with interaction effects between sex and conditions, and between conditions and trials, p4 .05. Results supported the combined IF condition with counting as maintaining subjects' level of performance, probably through motivation. Males performed well under Conditions 1, 2, and 3, while girls performed best under Conditions 1 and 2. Trial scores under Conditions 2 and 3 for all subjects were much more similar than under Conditions 1 and 4, indicating more consistent performance when IF was provided,

An investigation of. quality practice in sport had the dual purposes of developing a conceptual model of quality practice arid proposing a definition of quality practice from the perspectives of expert coaches. Individual, semi-structured interviews were conducted with five expert coaches. The coaches were considered experts because they bad coached teams to World or National championships and worked with athletes who had attained recognizable excellence in their sports (All-American, Olympic Gold Medalist, or All-Pro). In addition the coaches represented individual team, male, and female sports. Analysis of the interviews was conducted using the qualitative methodology known as "grounded theory" (Glaser and Strauss, 1967) . Analysis of the interviews identified 138 meaningful bits of information ("meaning units" Tesch, 1990) . Results recommended a quality practice model consisting of four general dimensions. eight categories and 16 properties. The four general dimensions of the quality practice model were; a. personal factors of athletes, b. coaching philosophy, c. components of practice, and d. effort of athletes. The quality practice model that emerged represented a more comprehensive understanding of quality practice than had previously existed. The second purpose of the study was to propose a definition of "quality practice". The interviews with expert coaches suggested that quality practice as it pertained to sport was: "Quality practice is an effortful activity which is highly structured with specific goals and tasks aimed at thorough performance preparation. It is carried out with a total commitment of optimal intensity, energy, focus, awareness, enthusiasm and competitiveness. Results of the study suggested that "quality practice" existed in a conceptual and definable way. Expert coaches when discussing quality practice recognized the personal factors of athletes, had distinct coaching philosophies, carefully planned the components of practice; and consistently monitored the effort of the athletes.

Using a credibility scale that measures authoritativeness and character of a speaker as perceived by his audience, will a statistically significant difference rise where a figure of authority is a member of one ethnic group and those over whom the authority is asserted are members of a second ethnic group?

Industry has long been concerned about the supervisor-worker relationship and Green and Mitchell (1979) proposed a model of how supervisors process and respond to information regarding the cause for a subordinate's work failure. The model specifies a two-step process in which the supervisor first attributes a cause to the subordinate's behavior and then uses the causal attribution to aid in the selection of an appropriate disciplinary action. In athletics the coach is the leader and, therefore, the same process that exists for leaders in organizational and industrial settings may also apply to the athletic settings. This research examined whether the implementation of personal policy for a rule infraction would be influenced by the cause for the infraction, the severity of the penalty, and the importance of the offender to the group success. The study was performed within the setting of intercollegiate athletics. One hundred and fifty-nine male and female coaches were divided into two groups based on the personal characteristic of orientation toward winning (high vs. low). Each coach responded to a scenario that described a curfew violation committed by a star or a substitute player. The cause for the infraction was either internal or external and the policy was either mild or severe. Duncan's New Multiple Range Test revealed that: (a) coaches focused significantly (p < .05) more on the player and showed a significantly (p < .05) greater intensity toward the player when the cause for the curfew violation was internal rather than external; (b) orientation toward winning interacted with status of the player in determining whether to reduce penalty; and (c) the severity of personal policy was not significant. The results extend the Green and Mitchell (1979) attributional model of leadership and confirm the importance of personal characteristics in control decisions. / Ed. D.

Thesis (M.A.-Psychology)--University of South Africa, 2001.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether coaching behavior preferences of NCAA Division I athletes differ as a function of gender and type of sport. The Coaching Behavior Questionnare (CBQ; Martin & Barnes, 1999) was administered to 195 NCAA Division I athletes. Gender and sport type were the independent variables and the participant's mean scores for the subscales on the CBQ were the dependent variables. Descriptive statistics revealed that, overall, NCAA Division I athletes prefer positive and instructional behaviors more than non-responses or negative behaviors. A 2 (gender) x 3 (type of sport) MANOVA and follow-up discriminant function analysis indicated that coaching behavior preferences differed as a function of gender and type of sport played. Thus, NCAA Division I coaches should consider both individual and situational characteristics when working with their athletes to achieve the desired outcome.

This study was based upon the Multidimensional Model of Leadership (Chelladurai, 1978, 1990), and the administration of the Leadership Scale for Sport (LSS) and the Sport Orientation Questionnaire (SOQ) (Gill and Deeter, 1988). The purposes of the study were: 1) To determine the competitive achievement orientations (competitiveness, goal and win) and coaching behavior preferences (training and instruction, democratic, autocratic, social support, and positive feedback) among young male Thai athletes (n=403); and 2) to examine the relationships between competitive orientations and coaching behavior preferences among athletes for two different levels of competition, high and low; two different age groups, from ages 13-15 and 16-18; and two types of sports, team and individual. A preliminary MANOVA and ANOVAs indicated that significant age x type interactions contributed to the competitiveness achievement orientation and all coaching behavior preferences. Thai athletes showed the highest score for goal orientation, followed by competitiveness and win orientations. They preferred training and instruction, and social support coaching behaviors over democratic and positive feedback coaching behaviors. Autocratic coaching behavior was least preferred. Results of the ANOVAs indicated significant group differences in competitiveness orientation variables and all coaching behavior variables. Multivariate multiple regression demonstrated significant relationships between competitive achievement orientations and coaching behavior preferences. Canonical correlation analyses of the four age x type interaction groups were utilized, indicating bidirectional relationships between all of the competitive achievement orientations, and all of the coaching behavior preferences for older athletes who participated in either team sports or individual sports. The younger individual sport athletes presented a relationship between training and instruction, democratic and social support coaching behavior preferences and all competitive achievement orientations, whereas younger team sport athletes showed no relationship. This finding indicated a stronger influenced of coaching behavior preferences on younger individual sport athletes' competitive achievement orientations. / Graduation date: 1993