ORIGINAL ARTICLE   

Gazzetta Medica Italiana - Archivio per le Scienze Mediche 2021 November;180(11):707-14

DOI: 10.23736/S0393-3660.20.04526-X

Copyright © 2020 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

lingua: Inglese

Passion level of taekwondo athletes reveals the fundamental coaching method for controlling exercise dependence

Youngtaek OH ✉

Department of Kinesiology, College of Natural Science, Jeju National University, Jeju, South Korea

BACKGROUND: In the sociology of sports psychology, structural equation modeling analysis has been used to investigate the relationship between passion and exercise dependence. However, there are no studies available that have examined how to apply such an approach to taekwondo athletes. Therefore, the current study tests the causal relationship between passion as a psychosocial change of currently active Korean taekwondo athletes, types of coaching, and exercise dependence.
METHODS: The passion, coaching types, and exercise dependence of 192 elite taekwondo athletes who participated in the 100^th Korean National Sports Festival in 2019 were measured. The data was processed using the programs SPSS18.0 (IBM, Armonk, NY, USA), PROCESS Macro (V.2.13; https://www.processmacro.org/index.html), and Amos 18.0 (IBM).
RESULTS: Harmonious passion, which is related to the autonomy of taekwondo athletes, was shown to have a positive effect on autonomy supportive coaching, but a negative effect on controlling coaching. In addition, obsessive passion, which causes stress, was shown to have a negative effect on autonomy supportive coaching, but a positive effect on controlled coaching. Autonomy supportive coaching was revealed to have a positive effect on time and tolerance, and controlled coaching was shown to have a positive influence on continuance, control, time, and intention. The investigation of the mediating effects based on direct effects indicated that harmonious passion had a significant direct effect on tolerance and time via autonomy supportive coaching and an indirect effect on lack of control and intention effects via controlled coaching. Moreover, obsessive passion was shown to have an indirect effect on tolerance time via autonomy supportive coaching, and it had an indirect effect on lack of control, time, and intention effects through controlled coaching.
CONCLUSIONS: The data of this study imply that among the taekwondo athletes’ two-dimensional level of passion, athletes with a high level of harmonious passion must meticulously manage their level of controlled coaching to control exercise dependence. Athletes with high levels of obsessive passion need psychological control to decrease exercise dependence, and a strategy must be developed to increase the level of autonomy support coaching.

KEY WORDS: Exercise; Athletes; Sports