2017 年 50 巻 1 号 p. 1-11
The purpose of this study was to investigate motivational factors related to visually-impaired athletes practicing judo. It intended to clarify the reason why visually-impaired judo practitioners continue training in judo compared to their normal sighted counterparts.
The subjects were 38 male visually-impaired judo athletes aged 19-62 who participated in the All Japan Blind Judo Championships (the visually-impaired judo athlete group). A control group was formed made up of 38 male sighted judo players who were systematically drawn from prior research. Subjects were asked to answer a questionnaire containing 21 items related to possible reasons for continuing to do judo, such as, “character development”, “positive feelings”, “improving physical fitness”, “improving mental condition”, “attraction to martial arts”, “personal goals”, and “recreation”.
Four factors were extracted from the sighted judo player group but five factors were extracted from the visually-impaired judo athlete group. Four of the factors—“positive feelings”, “personal goals”, “character development” and “improving physical fitness”—were common to both groups. Factors unique to each group were “sociability” in the visually-impaired judo athlete group, and “Jita Kyōei” in the control group.
The results of a simple comparison show that the scores for “fun”, “future goals” and “popular” of the visually-impaired judo athlete group were significantly higher than that in the control group (p<0.01). The “increasing health” score of the control group was significantly higher than the visually-impaired judo athlete group (p<0.05).
In summary, this study indicated similarities and differences in the reasons for continuing judo in visually-impaired and sighted judo players. It seems that “fun” and “sociability” are more important factors for continuing judo among visually-impaired judo athletes compared with sighted judo players.