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The influence of mental toughness and self-regulation on post-season perceptions in varsity athletes
Alison Crawford1, Dean A Tripp2, Madelaine Gierc1
1Department of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
Objective:
To investigate whether pre-season self-reported mental toughness and self-regulation strategies predicts post-season stress, mental health, group cohesion, and satisfaction in varsity athletes.
Participants:
Sixty-seven varsity athletes from a U-Sport Canadian university.
Methods:
Athletes completed pre- and post-season measures of mental toughness, emotion regulation, self-control, group cohesion, and satisfaction. Multiple mediation models were employed during analyses.
Results:
Pre-season emotion regulation was a significant mediator for the relationships between mental toughness and post-season ratings of perceived stress, perceived mental health, and group cohesion. Self-control was not a significant mediator.
Conclusions:
Emotion regulation plays a significant role in an athlete's experience of perceived stress, mental health issues, and their ratings of group cohesiveness. Research on student-athlete health may benefit from examining emotion regulation training techniques.
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