The Relationship Between the Perceived Motivational Climate on High School Soccer Teams and Athlete Self-Efficacy, Cognitive Anxiety, and Somatic Anxiety While Playing

Abstract

Youth participation in sport can play an integral part in growth, such as advancing social skills (Weiss et al., 2018). Youth sport researchers (Côté & Fraser-Thomas, 2007) argue that the primary focuses for youth athletes should be fostering enjoyment, promoting skill acquisition, and encouraging character growth. However, research has demonstrated that youth sport participation is on the decline due to failure to meet these components (Dunn et al., 2022; Ommundsen et al., 2006). A large factor in determining youth participation is the motivational climate that leaders create in sport settings. Specifically, a large body of literature has suggested that ego-involving climates elicit negative motivational and performance outcomes, whereas caring, task-involving climates are seen to create positive outcomes (Fry & Moore, 2019; Hogue et al., 2013). However, there is a gap in the literature looking at youth soccer athletes’ perceptions of the motivational climate and state anxiety measures. This study explores the relationship between such motivational climates and psychological outcomes (i.e., selfefficacy, cognitive and somatic anxiety) in youth soccer athletes (N= 27, Mage=15.64, SD=1.13). Results indicated that caring, task-involving climates were significantly associated with higher levels of self-confidence and lower somatic anxiety, whereas ego-involving climates demonstrated a strong positive relationship with somatic, and cognitive anxiety, and a strong negative relationship with self-confidence. Findings demonstrate that fostering a caring, task-involving climate can benefit athletes’ mental preparedness. This can be used to implement evidence-based and theoretically guided interventions for coaches, bolstering youth athletes' participation and enjoyment in all environments.