Coaching Styles and Their Effects on Athletes

Abstract

This literature review examines and analyzes the effects that various styles of coaching have on athletes. The coach has been said to be one of the most important influences upon an athlete’s motivation (Amorose & Anderson-Butcher, 2007), and I believe this to be undeniably true. How a coach talks and acts toward an athlete, as well as how he or she talks and acts in general, has a great effect on the athlete’s willingness to participate, their willingness to better themselves in the sport, their state of mind, their psychological well-being, their self-confidence, their self-esteem, their feelings of self-worth, and how they act towards their teammates and opponents. This review contains several studies performed by various authors which tested how coaching styles can affect athletes. It was found that coaches who use positive methods of coaching will more often have athletes who are more intrinsically motivated and coaches who use negative methods of coaching will have athletes who are more extrinsically motivated and/or less intrinsically motivated.