A Study of Youth Soccer Players' Motivation in Jiangsu, China

In recent years, soccer in China has achieved great progress. Research involving youth soccer players' motivation, however, has rarely been covered. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to explore the essential factors that motivate youth soccer players to continually engage in practices a...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Research quarterly for exercise and sport 2016-06, Vol.87 (S2), p.A21
Main Authors: Xie, Li Sheng, Zeng, Zhenhao H, Meng, Wen Yan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Data Analysis
Goal Orientation
Goal setting
Likert Scales
Motivation
Multivariate analysis
Second Languages
Soccer
Statistical Analysis
Team Sports
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:In recent years, soccer in China has achieved great progress. Research involving youth soccer players' motivation, however, has rarely been covered. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to explore the essential factors that motivate youth soccer players to continually engage in practices and competitions so that meaningful information and feedback can be provided to their soccer community. The findings will enable them to improve their teaching/coaching and manage various competitions better. Ninety-eight boy soccer players (ages 13 - 15 years; 52 supported by parents, 46 supported by school; 58 want to be professional and 40 want to be nonprofes- sional) from 10 middle schools (Jiangsu Province, China) participated in this study. The Adapted Questionnaire of Soccer Player's Motivation-Chinese Version (Zeng, 2015) was employed for data collection. This instrument consists of 28 items: 10 items asked participants' general information; 1 question asked, "What reasons/factors motivate you to take-part in soccer practices and competitions continually?" and 18 reasons/factors (RFs) were provided. Participants responded to the question on a 5-point Likert-type scale (e.g., 5 points represent "strongly fit" and 1 point represents "not fit"). Data analysis was done by descriptive statistics and a 2 (supporting: by parents or by school) £ 2 (goal setting: for professional or for nonprofessional) factorial multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA). Findings included: The top 5 higher scores from the 18 RFs were RF1, "high technical content and unique value" (M ¼ 4.73); RF4, "make new friends" (M ¼ 4.42); RF2, "fun and get rid of boredom" (M ¼ 4.34); RF5, "to contest winners" (M ¼ 4.31); and RF11, "to establish prestige" (M ¼ 4.29). These RFs possess a significantly higher impact on soccer players' motivation. The results of 2 £ 2 MANOVA revealed: no significant difference in the "supporting" aspect ( p . .05, L ¼ .78, F ¼ 1.16); however, a significant difference was found in the "goalsetting" aspect ( p , .00, L ¼ .03, F ¼ 143.61). The follow-up test revealed that 13 out of 18 "goal-setting" comparisons reached significant difference ( p , .05) level with "for professional" scoring higher than "for nonprofessional" (e.g., RF4, "make new friends"; RF6, "shape the body"; RF8, "to become a professional"; and RF15, "develop soccer skills"). In conclusion, the intrinsic RFs appear to score higher than extrinsic RFs and possess a higher impact on structuring these y
ISSN:0270-1367
2168-3824