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Part I
Contextual Understanding
We begin by looking at the basic contextual understanding and considerations important to get oriented. Like receiving a GPS signal to establish our location and current environment, this is the most important starting point. All too often we focus on the end result or destination without taking full account of where we are, our resources and the situation at hand.
Identifying the ethical values that guide professional practice need to be established up front, although in the real world, it’s often hard to anticipate the challenges that you will face. Without identifying these values up front, you set yourself up for failure in managing the dangers and pitfalls ahead. With as much as we know about human behavior, there are more questions than answers, and our flexibility and ability to deal with individual contexts will make or break successful practice, regardless of professional role.
Context is also relative from person to person. Personality theory and how to deal with individual and cultural differences are age-old fields of study within psychology. The opportunity to understand human behavior from these viewpoints provides a gateway to understanding how people perform in sport, exercise and other performance domains, including educational, military, medical and business settings. Each of these contexts can dramatically influence program development, not to mention sensitivity around age, gender, skills and abilities.
The final section is dedicated to creating context that delves into working with organizations. The landscape of job opportunities in the Sport, Exercise and Performance Psychology (SEPP) industry has shifted, and it’s important to acknowledge this change. We address here the role that working with organizations plays since a good deal of work done in the SEPP environment focuses on individual work; however, there is a great deal of value in organizational settings that is receiving increased focus, but still a world of opportunity (Wagstaff, 2016).
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1 Introduction
J. Gualberto Cremades and Angus Mugford
The study of human behavior is a complex field, but the reward is in developing an understanding of people. As social beings, where work, life and performance is driven by thoughts and behavior, a deep knowledge and understanding of people is invaluable. While it may seem straightforward to gather the lessons from the very best scientists, practitioners and teachers, it is unrealistic to think that they are all in agreement. Indeed, sometimes the best insights come from disagreement and exploration of where theory and practice diverge. This book serves to create a bridge between the breadth and depth of knowledge in sport, exercise and performance psychology. The goal is to present and explore the basics that apply to the variety of current theories and evidence-based practice relevant to students, practitioners, teachers and researchers.
WHAT ARE SPORT, EXERCISE AND PERFORMANCE PSYCHOLOGY (SEPP)?
To begin this journey means to define what each of these respective fields are. The complexities created by international regulations, philosophical differences and educational systems mean that there is no specific common and accepted definition of SEPP. Throughout the years, there have been several definitions in the literature of sport, exercise and performance psychology (Quartiroli & Zizzi, 2011; Weinberg & Gould, 2011; Wilkes & Cote, 2007). However, Cremades, Tashman and Quartiroli (2014) gathered and proposed three definitions, which will form the basis of how we choose to refer to each of these specialties. Sport,
Exercise, which based on the definition stated below, could also be labeled as “Health, Exercise and Physical Activity Psychology”,
Performance,
The breadth and scope of these three divisions is open to different definitions and interpretations of theories and applications. This presents both an advantage and disadvantage to neophyte practitioners and researchers. For example, the American Psychological Association (APA) alone constitutes 56 separate interest groups. There is power in a unified body that houses many specialist interests under one roof; however, while SEPP appears to fall into the fold of the APA, the truth is that they also draw from fields outside of traditional psychology including sport science and kinesiology, management and organizational behavior, behavioral sciences in medicine and even the unregulated self-help industry. The latter is estimated as a $12-billion-a-year business, despite the fact that many of the benefits are unsubstantiated (Vanderkam, 2012). The strength of drawing content and research from such different domains is that we often gain insights, understanding and new solutions to common problems by looking outside our typical frame of reference. This can become hard to regulate, standardize or be inclusive of such diverse groups. Indeed, one of the challenges that comes with diversity is the effect of silos and internal politics that prevent effective interaction and collaboration between these communities.
As is common with findings in realistic conflict research (Sherif, Harvey, White, Hood, & Sherif, 1961; Kenrick, Cialdini, & Neuberg, 1999), the way to increase resolution and relationships between ‘competing’ groups is to use collaboration as a means to achieve common goals. The reality is that there are many common challenges faced by mankind, and there is plenty of work and opportunity to make a positive impact on people’s lives through sport, exercise and performance psychology.
A challenge that many students face coming into this field is that there are so many opportunities, including many different paths of study. It can be hard to predict what paths lead to the most satisfying job opportunities, and, indeed, their dream job may not exist yet. Unlike some career paths that have a very clear track, the SEPP pathway can be extremely complex and ambiguous. There are more resources and texts addressing this now (Cremades & Tashman, 2014; Taylor, 2014), and this also aims to identify many of the common concerns and themes that transcend these different domains.
Defining the Different Types of Roles in SEPP
While this text may be largely directed to students undergoing their training in SEPP-based programs, there are four main tracks of industry roles that are the focus of discussion.
Practitioners: These are full-time psychologists who may work in a private practice, hospital or health care setting. However, it may also include mental performance consultants who are not licensed psychologists, but have training in applied sport, exercise or performance psychology and conduct full-time consulting and coaching services to clients across a variety of platforms.
Researchers: These are scientists housed in academic departments or the private sector, including government entities or business. These individuals and research teams study various aspects of human behavior, participating in grants and funded research, publishing findings, presenting at conferences or gaining competitive advantage for their organization.
University/College Teachers: Many teachers become hybrids given the nature of their skill set. Typical teachers receive graduate level training in research and may be required to continue scholarly activity through conducting further research as part of their tenure, but they also teach students and provide service to their university or college. Service can be seen in many different ways, from participation in university community activities, to serving on special interest committees and providing consulting work with athletic departments or student health projects.
Hybrids: As mentioned, teachers are often the most common hybrid, but these professionals usually split their time between each of these domains. There are advantages and disadvantages to each of these; however the hybrid is usually able to craft their schedule and work-life balance by increasing job security and variety of opportunities. Typically they may be the most stretched of each profession, but they have the scope to pick and choose the opportunities that most appeal to them and allow a combination of skillsets. The downside of course is that they may not develop a deep skill set in any one particular area.
CHALLENGES FACED BY KEY STAKE HOLDERS
With the diversity already mentioned across each of these domains and roles, there are a number of challenges and opportunities faced by people all across the world. By addressing many of these questions at the outset of this introduction, we can provide better insight into the heart of the issues in the SEPP field and generate a solution-focused approach to navigating the practical realities faced by many. There is no ‘one-size fits all’ approach that is right or wrong, but our responses are based on insights and opinions from a variety of perspectives, meaning that we provide greater discussion and clarity over valid but rarely discussed challenges from opposing views. The questions and commentary offered here are intended as a foundation for context leading into the chapters that follow, where leading academics and practitioners share the nexus of theory and practice across SEPP domains. By exploring some of the contemporary questions faced by different stakeholders, we hope that this initial introduction helps convey the context of the profession and questions that need to be answered in order to apply the lessons of psychology to people in these different domains.
Questions and Challenges from Faculty
Should We be Training Generalists, or Specialists?
It is fair to say that by design, most undergraduate programs provide the broadest educational platform for graduate school, where a master’s degree and doctoral degree increasingly provide specialization. However, it may in fact be post-graduate studies before true specialization occurs. Medical and legal education provides precedent, although the pathways and legal regulations for those fields are much clearer than in many SEPP tracks, except for clinical psychology, which follows a medical model. The incentive towards generalization comes with two main arguments. The first and perhaps most important is that the benefit of interdisciplinary work means that professionals have a broad understanding of domains so that they can collaborate effectively with other disciplines and utilize a more holistic perspective in order to problem solve and support client goals. The second argument, perhaps more economical and related to resource management, is that through geographical scarcity or lack of access to resources, someone might be isolated and in need of a broader knowledge base to support a client population, both out of necessity, but also perhaps due to competitive advantage in the market place.
In professional sports in North America, we have been entering an era of specialization where the number of staff employed in specialist roles has been increasing steadily (Mugford, Kamphoff, Clark, & Pandya, 2017). This is a sign that focus on specific competencies and expertise is valued, although these may be more relevant to where resources are already high. This is perhaps less about competitive advantage for the consultant, but more about the competitive advantage for the client. This increase isn’t just in professional sport, but also seems to be the case with at NCAA institutions creating guidelines to support hiring of sport psychology-related professionals (Neal et al., 2013). Likewise, military contractor roles for applied sport psychology professionals in the United States have been advertised and filled over the last decade.
The argument for generalist over specialist is perhaps less about either/or, but more about context and understanding the overall objectives of the program and the client base that is the focus of service.
Questions and Challenges from Students
There are many paths into a graduate program, some straight after an undergraduate education, but for many this may be after a period of working in another industry or after a period between formal education. When looking at programs there are many questions to consider, and even once a program is selected there can be many decisions that may shape or influence their future career. Some of the most relevant discussed include the following:
What Graduate Degrees Should I Consider?
It’s hard to start out with the end in mind, but this is part of selecting the right course for you. When beginning with a master’s program, one of the logical strategies is to try to keep as many options open as possible. Creating flexibility and understanding what options you are closing off by making a selection is important. There are many ways to find out what programs to consider, but getting a breadth of information from credible sources is key. For example, attending professional conferences while still an undergraduate can help you physically meet and interact with both students and faculty from various programs and allow you to ask pertinent questions to your decision-making process. Resources through professional organizations like the APA and Association for Applied Sports Psychology (AASP) can also help provide guides or objective material. Resources like the Directory of Graduate Programs in Applied Sport Psychology (12th Edition, 2018) are available both online and in print, providing insight ...
