Sport Coaches Burnout as a Threat to Professional Success, Mental Health and Well-Being

Abstract

The article explores motivational and personality predictors of burnout syndrome in sports coaches. The study involved 183 sports coaches of 20–63 years old (86.9% women; M=41.34±10.56 years), with professional experience for 13.83±9.98 years. Three components of professional burnout ― Emotional exhaustion, Depersonification and Reduction of professional achievements ― were measured with the adapted Maslach professional burnout inventory (Vodopyanova, et al 2008). Motivational aspects were measured with the adapted Ryan and Connell Professional Motivation inventory (Osin et al, 2017). Personal resources ― stress resistance, authenticity and coping strategies ― were measured with the adapted Connor-Davidson Stress Resilience Scale (Nartova-Bochaver et al., 2021), the Moscow Authenticity Scale (Reznichenko et al., 2021) and the adapted Proactive Coping Questionnaire adapted (Belinskaya et al, 2018). The results showed that amotivation and external motives of professional activity are linked positively and internal motivation linked negatively to professional burnout. Furthermore, the links between the types of motivation and the components of burnout in different combinations are mediated by stress resistance, authenticity, and coping skills that prevent burnout. The strongest link of motivation and personal resources was revealed for the Reduction of professional achievements; the weakest link was in the context of Depersonification of a sports coach. Burnout was also positively linked to age and negatively to coaches' experience. The data obtained can be used to form preventive interventions that reduce the burnout of coaches and increase their professional performance, mental health and subjective well-being.