Sport and Exercise Psychology Studies in Brazil: Performance or Health?

Area of Science:

• Sport and Exercise Psychology (SEP)
• Psychology
• Exercise and Sport Science

Background:

• Limited professional integration of psychologists in Brazilian sports teams.
• Infrequent offering of Sport Psychology courses in undergraduate Psychology programs.
• Lack of comprehensive mapping of scientific knowledge production in SEP within Brazil.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate institutional research and thematic focus in Sport and Exercise Psychology (SEP).
• To analyze research directions within Exercise and Sport Science and Psychology graduate programs in Brazil.

Main Methods:

• Data retrieved from the Sucupira Platform national database.
• Analysis of research from 31 Exercise and Sport Science and 84 Psychology graduate programs.
• Text mining, latent semantic analysis, and K-means clustering using R software.

Main Results:

• SEP research predominantly occurs in Exercise and Sport Science graduate programs (n=171) compared to Psychology programs (n=39).
• Research is concentrated in the southern and southeastern regions of Brazil.
• Exercise and Sport Science programs focus on physical exercise, quality of life, health, and education; Psychology programs examine sport's association with health, education, social support, and psychological aspects.

Conclusions:

• Exercise and Sport Science graduate programs make the most significant contribution to SEP research in Brazil.
• Current research focuses on the intersection of exercise with quality of life, health, and education.
• Gaps exist in advancing studies on sports and performance within Psychology graduate programs.