engleski

The role of double career related factors in the premature retirement from competitive sports: A qualitative study

The aim of the article is to present the role of the double career related factors in the premature sports career termination, i.e. retirement from sport prior to achieving elite level and top results. While a vast majority of the career termination studies focused on retirement following elite athletic careers, this study aimed at examining the characteristics of an early or premature retirement from sports. Transitions out of sport require requires adaptation on psychological, psychosocial, academic, and occupational levels. Previous studies have described several factors, for example, retirement planning, athletic identity, coping strategies and some others that strongly influence the quality of athletic retirement and its outcomes. The aim of the research is to study them from a qualitative perspective. Since athletes who retired before they advanced to the senior level were older adolescents, the study also focused on the developmental psychological characteristics of the transitional athletes. Study involved 22 Slovenian male- and female-athletes of 19-22 years old, competed in various sports, and terminated their careers less than three years before the data collection. They all were recognized as talented juniors but terminated their careers before they reached the senior elite level. A semi-structured in-depth interview guide on sports career termination was designed by the first author to elicit characteristics of the transitional process from a holistic perspective outlined by the developmental model of transitions faced by athletes. The interview data was content-analyzed. Besides themes that are characteristic for the developmental stage of late adolescence, results accentuated factors associated with former athletes’ adaptation to the demands of double career. The results will be discussed in regard of the developmental model and previous research on athletic retirement.

education; sport; career transition; career termination

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