N. Ntoumanis et Sjh. Biddle, THE RELATIONSHIP OF COPING AND ITS PERCEIVED EFFECTIVENESS TO POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE AFFECT IN SPORT, Personality and individual differences, 24(6), 1998, pp. 773-788
This article examined the ability of six different coping strategies a
nd their perceived effectiveness in predicting positive and negative e
ffect in sport. Furthermore, it was investigated whether perceived cop
ing effectiveness moderated the influence of coping strategies on affe
ct. British University athletes (N = 356) were requested to recall a r
ecent important competition in their sport when they had a stressful o
r challenging experience. They were then asked to rate the extent to w
hich they relied on a number of different coping strategies to deal wi
th the situation and the degree to which they found these effective. I
n agreement with the theoretical predictions of Folkman (1984), proble
m-focused coping predicted positive affect whereas emotion-focused cop
ing predicted negative affect. Furthermore, for almost all the coping
variables, their perceived effectiveness predicted, in a positive way,
positive affect and negatively, negative affect. Moreover, the percei
ved effectiveness of the coping strategies of seeking social support,
venting of emotions, and behavioural disengagement, moderated the infl
uence of those strategies on affect. Lastly, a comparison between high
and low effective coping groups showed that the former was associated
with more pleasant affective experiences. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science L
td. All rights reserved.