Effectiveness of sports science literacy programs designed for behavior change in Japanese talented athletes and importance of the programs: by clarifying via self-evaluation

Abstract

Talent identification and development (TID) becomes an indispensable part of athlete development pathways in high-performance sport. Japanese talented athletes identified by local TID (LTID: the projects led by each prefecture) have been educated through sports science literacy programs to change behavior for enhancing sport performance. It remains unclear whether the effects of behavior change up to 6 months after the literacy programs intervention and the importance of the literacy programs for talented athletes. The purpose of this study was to clarify these issues using a questionnaire survey based on the self-evaluation of 43 talented athletes in the LTID project (aged 14 to 15 years). The results showed that more than 80% of the talented athletes progressed from the “precontemplation” or “contemplation” phase to the “action” phase in the behavior change stages after the literacy program intervention. Six months after the intervention, more than 70% of the talented athletes reached the “maintenance” phase in the behavior change stages. In addition, over 90% of the talented athletes indicated that the literacy programs were important or somewhat important. These results suggested that the intervention of sports science literacy programs had a positive effect on behavior change for talented athletes in LTID and the importance of the literacy programs. However, further studies are needed with more comprehensive perspectives that may include other objective measures of behavior change and its association with long-term improvement in sport performance.