European Journal of Experimental Biology Open Access

Keywords

Coach’s Feedback Behavior, Satisfaction & Intrinsic Motivation

Introduction

Among the three factors of athlete, coach and spectator, coaches are the main and most important pillar for sport teams. The coach in leading the team is a strong organizer and infrastructure for any progress.in some studies it have been shown that the behavior of team's coach is a predictive for success in competition [1]. Gilbertson (2000) in an extensive research introduced the critical success factors in the sport as follows: Coach or leader, goals, skills, resources, motivation and innovation. Each of these factors contributes in the team's success. Although it is possible that coaches in terms of character, ability and leadership behaviors may differ with each other, and no doubt these factors have a significant impact on physical and psychological of the players [2,3]. Recently, extensive researches inside and abroad about leadership styles and behaviors of coaches have been examined. In this field the Studies of Cheladori, had extensive and valuable role. Based on the model of Cheladori, the behavior of the coaches affects the athletes' satisfaction and psychological conditions (such as motivation and self-confidence) [4]. Many researchers have examined the behavior of coaches on the satisfaction of athletes [2,5-11] and some studies have examined the behavior of coaches on the motivation of athletes [12-14]. One of the important aspects of the coaches' behavior in some of these studies is coaches' feedback and in the others it has been ignored. Some researchers have claimed that this has the most influence on satisfaction and motivation. Allen and Howe, while studying the pattern of coaches' feedback on the satisfaction of athletes, reported that the behavior of positive feedback, and the feedback information after successful implementation and corrective feedback behavior following the unsuccessful implementation has the most effect on the athletes' satisfaction [15]. Amorous and Horn, also found in a study that the use of positive and information feedback not using from negative feedback with high levels of motivations in athletes has positive and significant relationship [5]. In this study the feedback behavior of coaches in 5 dimensions of positive feedback, informational feedback, negative feedback, corrective feedback, and ultimately the behavior without feedback were evaluated for successful or failed implementation of athletes and its relationship with the athletes' satisfaction and internal motivation has been examined. Because an athlete has different operation and performance under different conditions the importance of psychological issues and team conditions will be appeared; so our hardworking coaches should have acted beyond the terms and prepare the conditions for the athletes. Considering issues like that when the coach should encourage players and praised, or amended and supplemented information provided to improve the performance of athletes, and if it is necessary to appropriately punish the player, or No. The present study examined the effect of feedback behavior of coaches on the intrinsic motivation and satisfaction of elite athletes in Golestan province.

Materials and Methods

Players of 10 teams in Golestan province in 2010-2011 season of Championship Premier League or Division I of the country in basketball, volleyball, karate and Kabaddi (men and women) constitute the statistical society of this study. The sample of research was considered equal to statistical society and at the end from total of 155 distributed questionnaires, 134 questionnaires were usable and analyzed. 3 questionnaires used in this study. Coaches' feedback Behavior Questionnaire (Smith et al, 1977) with 26 coaches' behavior questions in 5 dimensions of positive feedback, information feedback, negative feedback, corrective feedback, and ultimately behavior without feedback was evaluated. Intrinsic Motivation questionnaire, which was made in 1989 by MacAuley et al is in the form of 18 questions that assess athletes in their sport. And finally the athlete satisfaction questionnaire which was written by Reimer & Chelladurai (1997) for assessing athletes' satisfaction with different aspects of exercise has been designed. The internal consistency of each questionnaire was obtained in a pilot study on athletes using Cronbach's alpha respectively (r=0.75), (r=0.81), and (r=0.79). After coordination with the CEO and club coaches, questionnaires were distributed and collected. Data analyzed using Kalmogrof - Smirnov tests, analysis of variance, Bonferroni post hoc test and Pearson correlation analysis were performed at a significance level of p ≤ 0.05.

Results

Test results of Kalmograf - Smirnoff rejected the assumption of non-normal distribution of data. By using analysis variance Test with Bonferroni post hoc test it was determined that there is a significant difference exists between 5 dimensions of feedback behavior of coaches and coaches use different patterns of feedback. The coaches used more feedback information and less negative feedback (Figure 1).

Diagram 1. Comparing the behavior of coaches' feedback

Using the Pearson correlation coefficient it was found that there is a significant positive correlation between intrinsic motivation of the behavior of coaches and players. Thus, positive feedback behavior has positive and meaningful correlation with increase of motivation of the players and negative feedback behavior of coaches had negative and meaningful correlation with increase of athletes' motivation. Also, There was no significant correlation between players' motivation and behavior modification information feedback and without feedback from coaches. (Table 1).

Table 1. Feedback Behaviors of coaches associated with motivation of players

Investigation of the Relationship between feedback behavior and satisfaction of players showed that there is a positive and meaningful relationship between feedback behavior, informational feedback and corrective feedback of athletic trainers with satisfaction of players, while there was no meaningful relationship between negative feedback behavior and behavior without feedback of coaches with satisfaction of athletes (table 2).

Table 2. Relationship of coaches' feedback behaviors and satisfaction of players

Discussion and Conclusion

Chelladurai (1990), Amorous and Horn (2000) and Smith (1998) reported in their models about behavior of coaches and different factors on them. Coach demographic information such as age, gender, experience, personality type, etc., and the club's circumstances, such as a ranked team on the table, and management's culture and ultimately the athletes characteristics such as age, skill level, personality, athletic trainers affect on the behavior of coach [4,5]. In Several studies the researchers have reported that coaches use from different behaviors. Results of Hosseini (2010), Vahdani (2012), Chelladurai (1990), Reimer and Chelladurai (1995) and Bennett and Manuel (2000) confirms this problem [4,16-19]. But in this study, one of the most important aspects of teachers' behavior (behavioral feedback) alone has been discussed and analyzed and the results of the study showed that there are significant differences between the five dimensions of behavior of coaches and they use different patterns of feedback. Coach's use from more feedback information and negative feedback is less used. It seems that due to the age and skills of the players and the team situation (professional teams), the coaches are cautious with emphasis on the positive behavior in the use of negative feedback. The Results showed feedback behavior of coaches affects intrinsic motivation and satisfaction of the players. In this case, the behavior of the positive feedback has significant association with increased motivation and behavior of players, and negative feedback has significant relationship by increasing the athletes' motivation. Amorous and Horn (2000) found in a study that using feedback behavior by coaches and nonusing of negative feedback with high levels of motivation in athletes has a significant positive association with the results of this study. Also, in the opposite point of not using negative feedback behavior by coaches leads to the increase of motivation by athletes which the results of this research and the previous researches confirms this. Although in most studies on the use of positive feedback behaviors by coaches has been emphasized (and not using negative feedback), in this research also the relationship between positive feedback behaviors with motivation of athletes (0.39) was more than the relationship of negative feedback behaviors with motivation of athletes (-0.28). Also researchers such as Kazemi (1379), Yousefi(1386), Black and Weiss (1992), Amorous and Horn (2001) and Hollembeak and Amorous (2004) also reported a significant relationship between the behavior of players, coaches and motivation. In this study, we followed up these relationships in professional sports and championship to be specified more precisely, that the feedback behavior of coaches, between 5 feedback dimensions of behavior of the coaches, importance of positive feedback behavior against informational feedback, corrective feedback and behavior without feedback were determined. However, the results indicated that there is significant positive relationship between the positive feedback behavior and the informational feedback of coaches with athletes satisfaction. Khalaj (2011), Norouzi (2013), Moradi (2013), Allen and Howe (1998) also investigated the effect of feedback behavior of coaches on the athletes satisfaction, and Positive and informational feedback behavior of coaches after successful implementation and corrective feedback after an unsuccessful run that had most effect on athletes' satisfaction [15,20-22]. which is in line with the findings. They didn't observe a meaningful relationship between negative feedback behavior and without feedback with satisfaction of athletes. Also In the past, researchers like Chelladurai (1990) and Weiss and Friedrich (1986) reported the behavior of coaches is effective for the satisfaction of the player, while Dexter (2002) and Cakioglu (2003) did not report a significant relationship between the behavior of, coaches and athletes' satisfaction. As it was observed, the findings showed that not using from feedback by coaches for successful or unsuccessful implementation of players has no meaningful relationship with their motivation and satisfaction. But there need more research in this case. Chelladurai (1990) predicted in his conceptual model on the behavior of coaches that the behavior of coach can has deep effects on the mental conditions, operation and satisfaction of the player. In this research also the aims of him was followed and also it was tried that one of the most important dimensions of coaches' behavior be explored. The findings showed that feedback behavior of coaches is effective on the motivation and satisfaction of players, especially positive feedback behavior and informational feedback after successful performance of player causes improvement in motivation and satisfaction and at the end increasing mental conditions of players.

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