A Review of the research in the coach-athlete psychological relationship:

Focusing on the studies with CART-Q

Abstract

    Since an objective instrument for measuring the nature of the coach-athlete relationship (i.e. The Coach-Athlete Relationship Questionnaire: CART-Q) was developed by Jowett and Ntoumanis (2004), a series of research related with the coach-athlete relationships and their psychology and behavior in sport activities have been published. The purpose of this article is to make an integrative review of those papers with their summation. Obtained research through the sport science data bases were categorized into two types. The research of the first type dealt with the consequences of the quality of the coach-athlete relationship, which indicated that the relationship influenced a wide range of individual athletesʼ behavior from self-concept, positive experience in sport, satisfaction, perceived improvement of performance, stress control, etc. This influence was extended not only to individual athletes but also to teams. The second type dealt with the influences of the quality of the relationship on teams, including group efficacy and cohesiveness of teams. As most research have focused upon the consequence of the coach-athletesʼ relationship, such research and coach education program as those focused on the psycho-educational interventions for improving the quality of the coach-athlete relationship are expected to be realized in the future.