Athlete-Centred Coaching in University Sport: A Foucauldian Analysis

• Author / Creator

  Pippus, Geoffrey

• Athlete-centred coaching is a relatively recent development in sport psychology which aims to empower athletes in an effort to improve their engagement, decision making skills, and performance (Kidman & Lombardo, 2010; Miller & Kerr,
  2002). While research emerging from youth sport and recreational settings supports the efficacy of this approach, there is little literature investigating how athlete-centred coaching is understood and utilized in high-performance sport.
  Informed by sociocultural research demonstrating the potential negative consequences of disciplinary coaching approaches which are common in high- performance sport (Barker-Ruchti & Tinning, 2010; Shogan, 2007), I investigated how, and to what extent, athlete-centred coaching was utilized in a university sport context by interviewing eight varsity head coaches. Located within the poststructuralist paradigm, I drew from the work of Michel Foucault (1995) and his analysis of discipline in an attempt to answer the following questions: In what specific ways do varsity coaches understand and implement athlete-centred coaching approaches? In what ways, if at all, do these specific practices depart from sport’s long-standing disciplinary framework? What difficulties or challenges do coaches face in attempting to implement athlete- centred approaches across the varying contexts of a university sport season?
  My findings suggested that the successful delivery of athlete-centred coaching in university sport is made difficult by ingrained power relations and forms of knowledge which have traditionally made the coach the primary decision maker. While coaches acknowledged the potential benefits of athlete empowerment, they struggled to successfully implement this approach because of such factors as the pressure to win and
  the need to coach individuals differently within the team structure. As a result, they frequently reverted to more traditional, disciplinary coaching tactics. Situations where coaches were more comfortable empowering their athletes included contexts away from the playing field such as setting team rules, electing captains, and policing the locker room. However when using athlete-centred coaching on the playing field, particularly when stakes increased and the pressure to perform was highest, coaches felt the need to take back control from their athletes to ensure a positive competitive outcome. Ultimately, this pressure to perform compromised the use of athlete-centred coaching tactics in this context.
  Despite the proposed benefits of athlete-centred coaching, my study provides evidence of the assertion made by Denison, Mills, and Konoval (2017) that athlete- centred coaching and other athlete empowerment initiatives do not sufficiently differ from traditional forms of coaching, and are largely rhetoric rather than true
  philosophies. Coaches used athlete-centred approaches as a tool to foster athlete engagement or increase motivation, rather than as an underlying philosophy informing every decision. While the intention of these approaches is to address a range of problems in sport, because they do not consider sport’s strong disciplinary legacy any claims they make for positive change are more often than not superficial. Based on my results I recommend a continued exploration of the ways in which social theory, and particularly the use of Foucault, can inform coaching knowledges in striving for effective and ethical practice. By carefully considering the problematic effects of discipline in making coaching decisions, coaches can take real steps towards encouraging athlete- empowerment.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Sociology
  • Sport
  • Foucault
  • Athlete-Centred
  • Coaching

• Graduation date

  Fall 2019

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Arts

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/r3-3cjf-8h48

• License

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