Young athletes’ psychological skills for performance: The role of perceived coaches’ interpersonal styles

Abstract

The aim is to examine the predictive power of perceived coaches’ interpersonal styles and youth athletes’ psychological skills profile, considering the role of gender. One hundred and three athletes (57.30 % male, 42.70 % female) between 15 and 28 years old (M = 20.40, SD = 3.08) participated in the study. Athletes’ psychological skills of motivation, positive coping and attitude control reported higher scores, differences according to gender were found. Likewise, coach’s autonomy support predicted more psychological skills in females, while coach’s controlling behavior predicted inversely positive and negative coping, attentional control and imaginery capability in males.