Scand J Med Sci Sports 2002: 12: 54–59 COPYRIGHT C MUNKSGAARD 2002 ¡ ISSN 0905-7188

Printed in Denmark ¡ All rights reserved

Elite athletes’ experiences of the motivational climate: The coach matters

A. M. Pensgaard1, G. C. Roberts2

1University of Birmingham, UK, 2Norwegian University of Sport and Sciences, Oslo, NorwayCorresponding author: Anne Marte Pensgaard, The University of Birmingham, School of Sport & Exercise Sciences, Edgbaston,B15 2TT, Birmingham, UK

Accepted for publication 14 May 2001

Recent research investigating the effect of the motivationalclimate has found that even elite athletes benefit from a mas-tery climate. The purpose of the present study was to obtaina deeper understanding of the importance of the climate sur-rounding an athlete and the role of the coach for elite ath-letes by conducting in-depth interviews with a group of ath-letes (nΩ7). The athletes also completed the Perception ofSuccess Questionnaire (POSQ) and Perception of Motiva-

Performance excellence is dependent on many fac-tors, both personal and situational. Recent researchfrom an achievement goal theory perspective has be-gun to address the environmental influence upon theperceptions of an athlete in the achievement context(Roberts, Treasure, Kavassanu, 1997). It has been ar-gued that the achievement criteria utilized by coachesmay impact on the perception of the environment,which may be a source of stress for the athlete(Pensgaard & Roberts, 2000). Elite athletes are gener-ally a very motivated group and they tend to havehigh scores on both task and ego orientation(Pensgaard & Roberts, 2000; Roberts & Ommunds-en, 1996). Thus, it seems reasonable to suggest thatthe perception of the climate will be of great import-ance for athletes at this level.

The purpose of this study was to continue this lineof research and obtain a more comprehensive insightinto how the athletes themselves experience the cli-mate that surrounds them and how important theyfeel that the environment is for their performance. Asecond purpose was to examine the role of the coachin creating a productive team atmosphere. The frame-work for this analysis was the achievement goaltheory as developed by Nicholls (1984, 1989).

Achievement goal theory

The goal of action in achievement goal theory is as-sumed to be the demonstration of competence. It isargued, however, that more than one conception ofability exists (e.g., Nicholls, 1989), and these different

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tional Climate Questionnaire (PMCQ) to measure motiva-tional indices. All the athletes were very high on task orien-tation and moderate to high on ego orientation. Most of theathletes perceived a high mastery climate and a low per-formance climate. The athletes emphasized the importanceof the coach as the creator of the climate, as well as theirpreference for a supportive and caring climate. This speaksfor an emphasis on a mastery climate for elite athletes.

conceptions of ability determine one’s affective andcognitive responses to achievement striving. Nichollsargued that two conceptions of ability manifest them-selves in achievement contexts, namely an undifferen-tiated concept of ability, where ability and effort arenot differentiated by the individual, and a differen-tiated concept of ability where ability and effort aredifferentiated (Nicholls, 1984, 1989).

An athlete approaches a task with certain goals ofaction reflecting his/her personal perceptions and be-liefs about the particular achievement activity inwhich he/she is engaged (Nicholls, 1984, 1989). Thesetwo conceptions of ability are assumed to be embed-ded within two achievement goal orientations (atleast) consistent with the conception of abilityadopted. The two conceptions of ability thereby be-come the source of the criteria by which individualsassess success. The goals of action are to meet thecriteria by which success is assessed. In this paper,the two goal states are termed task and ego. An indi-vidual who is task involved utilizes an undifferenti-ated conception of ability and the person’s actionsare aimed at achieving mastery, learning, and/or per-fecting a task. The individual evaluates personal per-formance to determine whether effort is expendedand mastery achieved; thus, the demonstration ofability is self-referenced and success is realized whenmastery is demonstrated. In contrast, an individualwho is ego involved utilizes a differentiated concep-tion of ability and the person’s actions are aimed atexceeding the performance of others. The individualevaluates personal performance with reference to the

Motivational climate and the coach

performance of others; thus, the demonstration ofability is other referenced and success is realized whenthe performance of others is exceeded, especially iflittle effort is expended (Dweck & Elliot, 1983;Maehr & Braskamp, 1986). One of the assumptionsof Nicholls’s (1989) approach to achievement goaltheory is that the goal orientations are orthogonal,and thus one can be high or low in either, or both.Clearly, individuals can be high in both task and egogoal orientation, or low in both, or high in one andlow in the other (Roberts, Treasure, Kavassanu,1997).

Whether one is in a state of task or ego involve-ment in sport achievement contexts is dependent onthe situation at hand and/or the dispositional orien-tation of the individual (Roberts, 1992). Situationalfactors, or what is called the motivational climate(Ames & Archer, 1988; Ames, 1992), induce states ofego or task involvement, and this seems to be particu-larly important among young individuals (Roberts,Treasure & Kavassanu, 1997; Treasure, 1997). If thesport context is characterized by interpersonal com-petition, social comparison, the coach emphasizing‘‘winning’’ and achieving outcomes, and a public rec-ognition of the demonstration of ability, then individ-uals are likely to be ego involved. Ames & Archerlabel this a performance climate. If, on the otherhand, the context is characterized by learning andmastery of skills, on trying hard to do one’s best, andwith the teacher or coach using private evaluation ofdemonstrated ability, then individuals are likely to betask involved. Ames & Archer call this a mastery cli-mate. Consequently, the terms performance and mas-tery are used to describe the two motivational cli-mates in this investigation.

Thus, an individual’s personal goal perspective andthe perceived motivational climate are significant ele-ments in the process of motivation (Roberts, 1992).The interplay between these factors is important, andif we assume that elite athletes are high in both taskand ego orientation, the perception of the climatemay be vital. It seems important, therefore, to obtaina better understanding of the climate surrounding theelite athlete and to examine the importance of thecoach in this respect.

A major challenge when studying elite athletes isthat they are, by definition, highly motivated individ-uals. Therefore, a ceiling effect may often occur whena quantitative approach is used to investigate, for ex-ample, individual goal orientations. Thus, the differ-ence in dispositional goal orientations may be toosmall for us to detect, especially with the limitedsamples one usually has when one studies elite ath-letes. However, when dealing with world-class ath-letes, one should be aware that even minor changescould have a considerable effect on both performanceand perceived ability. In our research, we either have

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to include more elite participants, which may be dif-ficult, or develop a more sensitive measurement tech-nology to capture the differences that may play amajor role for the athlete. As a means of trying to usea more sensitive measurement technology with theseathletes, qualitative procedures were employed usingan interview format. A qualitative research approachhas several advantages as opposed to more tra-ditional research methods, especially when we arestudying a special population (e.g., elite athletes), andwe want to gain in-depth information (Faulkner &Sparkes, 1999).

Material and methodsParticipants and procedure

After the Winter Olympic Games at Lillehammer in 1994, amajor investigation was conducted among all the Norwegianparticipants concerning motivational issues and coping withstress (see Pensgaard & Ursin, 1998; Pensgaard & Roberts,2000). Nine athletes who competed in the same skiing disciplinewere requested, as they completed the questionnaire, whetherthey would like to take part in an interview session. A list ofthe topics to be discussed was enclosed. The questionnaireswere mailed to the athletes together with a letter of recommen-dation from the Norwegian Olympic Committee and an in-formed consent form. It was emphasized that participation wasvoluntary and that they could withdraw at any time. One of thenine athletes who was initially asked to take part in the inter-view session refused without any specific reason given, and oneathlete did not reply. Seven athletes (5 males and 2 females)athletes were then contacted to complete an in-depth interview.The athletes ranged from 19 to 28 years (MΩ24.6 years) andthey had an average of 7.7 years of international competitionexperience (Table 1). Five of the seven athletes had earnedmedals at either the World Championships or Olympic Games.The criteria for inclusion were: a) that they represented thesame discipline; b) individual sport; and c) that all the athleteshad extensive experience at a high level.

Measurements

As part of the quantitative study conducted on all the Norweg-ian participants in the 1994 Winter Olympic Games, the ath-letes had to answer a test battery consisting of the Perceptionof Success Questionnaire (POSQ; Roberts, Treasure, Balague,1998) and the Perception of Motivational Climate Ques-tionnaire (PMCQ; Seifriz, Duda, Chi, 1992). The psychometricproperties for these measurements in this study are reportedelsewhere (Pensgaard & Roberts, 2000).

Interview guide

Qualitative research can be conducted in many ways based ondifferent epistemological rationales. An orientational qualita-tive inquiry approach was used in this particular study (Kvale,1996). This implies that there was an explicit theoretical per-spective when the interview guide was developed. Thus, the mo-tivational perspective adopted in this study determined the vari-ables and concepts focused upon, and it also guided the inter-pretation. This perspective was chosen because the aim was toget a deeper and more comprehensive understanding of someof the key variables within achievement goal theory.

The interview guide (available upon request from the firstauthor) developed for this study covered four main topics,namely: a) early stages of the athletes’ career; b) perception of

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Table 1. Descriptive motivational characteristics of the informants

Informant Age Years of Perception Task Ego Mastery Performanceinternational of ability orientation orientation climate climateexperience

1 27 8 World class 4.86 3.00 4.43 1.222 F1 19 3 National class 4.00 3.83 4.71 2.443 23 5 World class 5.00 4.50 3.43 1.444 F 24 8 World class 4.86 4.33 3.14 2.565 23 6 International 4.71 4.00 4.43 1.006 28 12 International 4.86 4.83 3.86 2.787 28 12 World class 4.86 5.00 4.14 3.56

1FΩFemale athlete.

and coping with stress; c) the 1994 Olympic experience; andd) the meaning of the coach and team climate. This paper isparticularly focused on part d). During this particular portionof the interview, the athletes were asked to answer and reflectupon the following main questions:

Question 1: What would you say about the importance ofthe team for you?

Question 2: How would you describe a favorable team cli-mate?

Question 3: What role do you feel that the coach has in cre-ating this environment?

Question 4: How would you describe the climate as a youngathlete, and the role of the coach?

All the athletes were asked identical questions in the sameorder of presentation to avoid interviewer biases (Kvale, 1996).However, when needed, additional follow-up questions andprobes were asked.

Interview procedure

The time and place for the interview was scheduled for theseven athletes who agreed to take part in this part of the study.The interviews were conducted at a site of the athlete’s choice.Five of the interviews were conducted at the Top Sport Centerin Oslo where most of the athletes do their physical training.One interview was conducted at the University of SportSciences, and one was conducted at the athlete’s home. Theinterviews lasted between an hour and one and a half hours.All interviews were conducted and transcribed verbatim by thefirst author, who has extensive training in qualitative method-ology. The transcribed interviews were then returned to the re-spondents for comments and/or correction, but no reactionswere received. The interviews were then translated into Englishby the two authors.

Data analysis

The qualitative approach to analyzing the interviews wasguided by an explicit theoretical framework, and this also di-rected the analysis and interpretation of the text. Thus, twohigher order themes were already established, namely the mean-ing of the coach and the meaning of the team and how thesethemes interacted with the motivational climate. Following therecommendations outlined by Kvale (1996), the theoreticalframework was applied to interpreting the meaning of a state-ment. This means that the interpretations are likely to go be-yond the self-understanding of the participant.

Results

The athletes who participated in this study were allhighly task oriented and moderate to high ego

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oriented (see Table 1). Most of the athletes perceiveda high mastery climate and a low performance cli-mate.

Quotations from selected athletes on each of thetopics the athletes were asked to reflect upon perti-nent to the questions of this study are presented. Thequotations are meant to illustrate the variety of re-sponses obtained. The first question reflected the ath-letes’ perception of the importance of the team.When we consider the motivational climate, otherteam members become elements in that environment.Thus, we wished to find out about the perception ofthe team members concerning the importance of theteam. All seven respondents emphasized that theteam is of major importance for both their perform-ance and their well being. This is nicely described byone respondent who said:

... Clearly, it means a lot. Because you are in an individualevent from start to finish. But the rest of the time you areon a team. And you are happy when others perform welland you cry together when that is the need and that’s theway it goes! So the climate of the team means a lot becauseif the climate is productive, and everybody pulls together,then you also push each other and the performance alsoimproves more than if you are on a team where some ath-letes don’t enjoy themselves and are unhappy with the train-ing, because then you use a lot of energy worrying aboutthat instead of focusing on the training ...

Another athlete goes even further and claims that:

... I think that that is the key to everything, that we have avery strong team-cohesion. I don’t think that there are manyother teams – not even in Norway, well perhaps in Norway –but not in any other country; there are not many individualsports that have as strong a team feeling as we have ...

The second question then went on to ask how theathletes would describe a productive team climate.Despite valuing the team, a concern was to have thefreedom to be oneself. The athletes frequently spendmore than 150 days together during any one season,and therefore it becomes important to be oneself andnot to have to play a role. As one athlete put it:

Motivational climate and the coach

... You must be able to be yourself when you are on theteam. You must be allowed to be an individual while on theteam, so to speak. It is that you don’t have to play a role,but can be yourself always. If you are moody one day, theothers accept that and do not pick on you all the time. Wehave a lot of freedom within the team but at the same timewe also have rules to follow ...

One athlete also highlighted the importance of sup-port and caring for each other:

... You can be yourself. And you can say whatever you meanwithout being left out. You know that you can be who youare and do what you want with whom you want. And alsothat we support one another. We are good at doing that! ...

The third topic pertained to the role of the coach.Ames & Archer (1988) claim that it is the teacher (orthe coach) who initiates and forms the achievementclimate. Therefore, it was of interest to get the ath-letes’ perceptions of the role of the coach in creatinga productive climate at an elite level. There was somevariability in how the athletes responded, but therewas an overall agreement that the coach does play asignificant role in determining the climate. This canbe illustrated by the following statements:

... They [the coaches] have a lot to say, absolutely. Becausethey are part of the puzzle, they have to be. And if the headcoach is grumpy, then there will be conflict. But if the coachinvolves himself in the team and becomes a friend and co-ach, then you can reach so much further – you are so muchstronger as an athlete ...

But some athletes also made the point that the coachmay be more important for some athletes than he isfor others, suggesting that the role of the coach mayvary from athlete to athlete. This may also depend onwhat kind of sport they are engaged in. One athleteexpressed the following:

... The coach is very important as the creator of the climate,I think that he is maybe more important for some than forothers. There are perhaps some who have a greater need forthe coach to be important for them than do others. I enjoyvery much to have him around, that he decides things andcan guide and coach me. Other athletes probably may wantmore freedom and to work on their own, so it is a big chal-lenge for the coach to know the needs of each athlete ...

Another athlete stated that the coach may influencesome aspects of the climate, but not all.

... I don’t think that the coach can do much when it comesto the relationship between the boys, whether they arefriends or not. But he can certainly decide other things, andin that respect he is important ... I feel that it is importantto have a coach who is sensitive to when an athlete is ableto receive criticisms and when he is a little vulnerable tocriticisms perhaps and maybe needs more encouragement ...

The last area that was discussed was how the athleteswould describe the climate surrounding them when

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they were young athletes. The respondents were strik-ingly similar in their description of how they per-ceived the climate at a younger age. One of them ex-pressed it this way:

It was very competitive, because he who was the best in myage group at the time was a member of my ski-club so wetrained together every day. And we had a tough competitionfrom when we were 11 until we were 16–17 years old. [..] Itled to both disappointments and to fun moments. But mygoal was to try and improve myself all the time.

Another athlete said:

I skied because it was fun and I had all my friends there. Andit went quite well, but I did not have any particular goal withwhat I was doing [...] I am very concerned about having fun.If it is no fun anymore, you will not get anywhere.

Competitiveness linked with a lot of fun seems to bethe general trend among these athletes. However, thecompetitive edge seemed to emanate from the interac-tion between the young athletes rather than beingcreated by the coach. A typical response was:

I would call them facilitators more than coaches, really. Myfather knew nothing about skiing technique, but we surehad a lot of fun!

Their unanimous advice to coaches who train 11 to12-year-old children today was that they should focuson having fun and variety in the training sessions.Not one of them uttered that it was important totoughen the children through harsh competition at ayoung age.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to expand an earlierpaper where we examined the independent effect ofthe motivational variables on the perception of stress,and where the coach was revealed to be a possiblesource of distress among some athletes (Pensgaard &Roberts, 2000). We wanted to investigate the athletes’own perceptions of the importance of the climate andthe role of the coach in this process.

The participants in this study were a highly elitegroup with very high scores on both the ego and taskgoal dimensions, supporting the contentions ofHardy (1997) about elite athletes. However, due tothis fact it seems plausible to suggest that elite ath-letes may be more sensitive, or at least react to fluc-tuations in the motivational climate. This was ex-plicitly stated by several of the interview informants,who placed great importance on the team climateand the climate created by the coach. The fact thatthe climate is so important even with elite athletes isencouraging because, as Whitehead et al. (White-head, Andree, Lee, 1997) have argued, the climate is

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easier to manipulate than the individual goal dispo-sitions.

The main architect of the motivational climate isassumed to be the coach (or teacher) (Ames, 1992).This was partly confirmed in the present study in thatthe coach has the power to make the athlete ‘‘muchstronger’’. Even athletes who have won World Cham-pionships and Olympic Medals emphasize that therole of the coach is important in that he or she issupportive and builds confidence. A focus on externalcriteria for success, such as is found in a performanceclimate, seems to be a mis-match with the needs ofthe athletes. Overemphasizing outcome criteria andthe results of competition can be extremely distress-ing, even for an elite athlete who already appreciatesthe consequences of a good or bad result. Within in-dividual sports, it is also reasonable to assume thatthere will be competition among the participants whoare part of the same team. Looking back, the athletesillustrated how they had been competing against theirpeers, while none of them described their coach asemphasizing a performance climate. The role of theteam mates may play a more influential role than wehave so far assumed. This leads to an obvious call toinvestigate the role of team members in creating theperceived motivational climate for elite athletes.

One other line of research that may prove valuableis to investigate the correspondence between the ath-lete’s perceptions of the coach as a coach and the cli-mate perceived to be extant, and the perception thecoach has of his or her own behavior and the climateperceived to be created by the coach. It could well bethat the coach has intentions of focusing on a mas-tery climate, but in fact the athlete perceives the cli-mate to be performance oriented due to the uninten-ded behaviors of the coach.

In the present study, an interesting aspect was todiscover the perception of the informants of what wasa productive climate. None of the athletes mentionedthat the climate should be focused on winning andbeating others, which is contrary to the contentionsof Hardy (1997) pertaining to elite performers. In thepresent investigation, the athletes in fact emphasizedthe importance of an accepting and caring climate,similar to what Ames & Archer (1988) label a mas-tery climate. It was stated by one of the athletes thatthis type of climate could be one of the most import-ant factors to explain the success the team partici-pants had had in the past.

Being able to be an individual within a team wasconsidered important due to the different needs ofthe athletes, much in line with what Deci & Ryan(1985) label an autonomy supportive climate, a cli-mate that is characterized by relatedness, understand-

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ing and respect, and minimal levels of pressure. Eliteathletes spend the major part of any one year to-gether with the other team members. Thus, this maybe why the climate is so important to the athletes inthe present study; it influences their lives to a greaterextent than athletes who compete on a lower level andwho spend most of their time away from other teammembers.

In-depth studies of the climate in elite sport, suchas we attempted here, may provide us with importantinformation about what a productive climate shouldemphasize. In this way, useful information can beprovided to coaches and administrators on how tocreate ‘‘athlete friendly’’ contexts in major sport com-petitions. Quantitative methods and analyses, and thedevelopment of a measurement technology to investi-gate both disposition and climate factors (e.g.,Duda & Whithead, 1998) have hitherto dominatedresearch that has employed the achievement goalframework to study motivational processes. Whilethis has provided valuable information on the influ-ence of achievement goals and the motivational cli-mate on both cognitive and affective responses (seeRoberts et al., 1997 for an extensive review), a naturalprogression seems to be to complement this researchwith qualitative procedures so that we are better ableto understand the dynamics of the motivationalequation for elite athletes.

Perspectives

The competitive world of elite athletes is in many as-pects extremely intense in that there is a constant fo-cus and expectancies of good results. An athlete whofails to meet these expectations may experience elev-ated levels of stress and loss of identity as an out-standing athlete. In order to cope with this situationand also to excel, elite athletes need a supportive sur-rounding social climate that is able to help the athleteshift the focus from outcomes and results to moretask relevant and constructive matters. This may alsohave a positive long-term effect on athlete’s health(Duda, 2001).

Once more, the present research underscored theimportance of the perceived climate for motivationalindices. Clearly, to support athletes within the com-petitive experience, coaches should focus on masterycriteria of providing success feedback, even to eliteathletes, to facilitate the performance and avoidbeing a potential source of distress for athletes.

Key words: elite athletes; qualitative experiences; mo-tivation.

Motivational climate and the coach

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