It is clear from what was written in the previous blog that a key role is played by those who lead groups in building a working climate that is helpful in sustaining motivation and providing adequate reinforcements to meet personal needs. In school, teachers who frequently exhibit controlling behaviors tend to build a controlling climate in the classroom, which reduces intrinsic motivation. It only takes a few weeks to bring about these kinds of effects, which in turn have an influence on students’ perceptions of competence. Therefore, extrinsic reinforcers can play a hindering or promoting function on intrinsic motivation depending on whether they are provided in a climate that is controlling or encouraging personal autonomy. If we want young people, including athletes, not only follow the rules proposed by their teachers but also actively integrate them into their personal belief systems, it is necessary that the environment in which they carry out their activities be oriented toward the development of personal competence and autonomy. Coaches should organize activities that solicit the interest of their athletes, reducing the frequency of those feedbacks that stimulate young people to get involved only out of duty, for the positive effects that will result or to satisfy the ambitions of the coach or parents.
Unfortunately, negative experiences in the sports community are not so uncommon. It becomes important to understand how the social and interpersonal context can foster the occurrence of these kinds of experiences. Again, self-determination theory makes it possible to explain “not only growth and well-being but equally the destructive, alienating and pathogenic effects of the need to hinder…” … In fact, deprivation of the fulfillment of basic needs for competence, autonomy and closeness to others can lead to choices that are often defensive and self-protective, fostering the onset of emotional disturbances and reduced personal well-being. This would lead to the prevalence of controlling motivation and rigid behaviors that in turn hinder the need for satisfaction, favoring the processes of extrinsic regulation (behaviors motivated by fear and rewards) and introjection (behaviors motivated by guilt and feeling obligated). Low levels of satisfaction, however, should not be confused with the athlete’s perception of feeling hindered in his or her activity. An athlete may feel dissatisfied because he or she perceives himself or herself as not competent to deliver the performance he or she expects, despite having worked hard to achieve this goal. Different is the condition of an athlete who attributes this difficulty to obstacles due to the behavior of the coach, whom he or she perceives as insufficiently oriented to make him/her improve. The former is a situation of dissatisfaction while the latter is a situation in which the athlete has been hindered in achieving the need for competence … To be dissatisfied means that something did not go as well as it should have while to hinder means to prevent something from happening. Therefore, feeling hindered consists of an emotional condition in which the person feels oppressed, inadequate, rejected or frustrated in a given context.
Top-level athletes need, like others, constructive support from their coach. A national team coach himself once told me:
“You see Alberto, he during the race, every now and then he looks for me with his eyes and I’m there to give him a nod or a gesture reminding him what to do, he then continues on his own and I see that it’s fine.”
Other athletes, however, say:
“When you need him, he’s never there, you look for him with your eyes and you see him on the phone or talking to someone….”
These two opposing experiences show how easy it is for a coach to engage in behavior that either supports the need for competence and closeness or hinders it. Top-level athletes recognize the central role of their coach, attributing to him or her not only the skills in organizing and conducting excellent workouts but equally emphasizing his or her motivational role … This constructive attitude was well described by Adrian Moorhouse when he talked about his coach:
“He believed in my potential, worked on my beliefs, helped me set goals that challenged me, encouraged and supported me, evaluated my performance, created the environment, and helped me take responsibility. The only thing he didn’t do … is swim races for me.”
(Da Alberto Cei, Fondamenti di psicologia dello sport, 2021)
