Zasetsu among male junior and senior high school athletes, and the process by which it is overcome

Abstract

It is well known that junior and senior high school athletes who participate in team activities face zasetsu (a Japanese word meaning setback, conflict, or disappointment) many times. Some give up sports activities as a result, whereas others overcome zasetsu and continue to be active in their respective teams. The purpose of the present study was to grasp the process by which young male athletes overcome zasetsu. The subjects were all 18-year-old freshmen (59 males) who had reached national level in their sports and had been admitted to their individual colleges on the strength of their sport performance. All had belonged to their respective teams for more than three years while at junior and/or senior high school. The study was conducted using an open-ended questionnaire in the second week of April, at which time the subjects would still have clear memories of their previous sports activities, being unaffected by any experiences at college. Using the KJ method, we analyzed qualitatively the components of zasetsu, the subjects' state of mind when suffering from zasetsu, and the process by which they overcame it. It was concluded that the process of overcoming zasetsu in sports activities involved an improvement of cooperative autonomy accompanied by a conflict with regard to whether or not the subjects continued their sports activities, when they did not achieve their goals. This concept might be generally applicable in view of its conceptual consistency with former reports, and the fact that our results were based on a sufficient number of cases.