Antecedents of state goals in age-group swimmers: an interactionist perspective

A theoretical tenet of 'goal perspective' theory that has received little research attention has been the nature of the relationship between the person and the environment with respect to predicting task and ego involvement in sport. This study therefore integrated both dispositional and situational criteria in order to examine their relative ability to predict 'state' goals of task and ego involvement in a sample of age-group swimmers (n = 214). The Task and Ego Orientation in Sport Questionnaire (TEOSQ) and several single-item assessments of goal orientation represented the dispositional measures, and these were completed away from the race environment. The situational antecedents of task and ego involvement were assessed by the 11-item Race Context Questionnaire (RCQ), which was administered to the swimmers within 1 h of their main event at their county championships. The RCQ also assessed the extent to which the performer had set task and ego goals for the upcoming race (i.e. 'state' goals). Factor analysis of the RCQ revealed four factors which cumulatively accounted for 65.3% of the variance: social/personal perceptions of ability; perceived state goal preference of significant others; race outcome value; and perceived readiness. Moderated hierarchical regression analyses revealed separate main effects as well as significant interactions between the dispositional and situational predictors of the different goal types. Specifically, social perceptions and race-specific criteria were the major predictors of ego involvement, whereas the level of task orientation combined with the above situational factors seemed to exert greater influence in determining the intensity of task involvement in age-group swimmers. These findings alert researchers to the importance of applying an interactionist perspective to the examination of 'state' goals.