Acta Univ. Palacki. Olomuc., Gymn. 2006 36(3): 21-28

Comparison of assessments of parents' and coaches' behaviour by male and female tennis players of different ages

Aleš Filipčič¹, Tjaša Filipčič²

¹ Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana

² Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana

Tennis is clearly one of those sports games where success is influenced by one's psychological abilities. Throughout their sports careers tennis players are usually exposed to psychological pressure. The aim of the study was to investigate how young tennis players assess the behaviour (psychological pressure) and activity of their mother, father and tennis coach. The sample included 96 male and 96 female players distributed in three age categories who filled in three questionnaires of the closed type. Data were processed in accordance with the research goals. Descriptive statistics parameters were calculated for all variables by gender: mean value, standard deviation, minimum, maximum, skewedness, kurtosis and the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test for normality. The analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to compare the assessments of behaviour of a player's father, mother and coach by gender and then between the three age categories (U12, U14, U16). A comparison between the assessments of the father's, mother's and coach's behaviour in terms of gender only revealed statistically significant differences in the assessments of the father. When assessments of both parents' and the coach's behaviour were compared in terms of age category, statistically significant differences were again established only in the assessments of the father.

Keywords: Tennis, juniors, parental and coach pressure

Prepublished online: February 12, 2009; Published: June 1, 2006  Show citation