An empirical investigation of sport stakeholders’ beliefs about whistleblowing against doping behaviour

ABSTRACT

The present study investigated the beliefs of athletes and sport stakeholders about whistleblowing against doping in elite competitive sport. Semi-structured interviews took place with five elite athletes, five coaches and five sport directors, from both team and individual sports in Cyprus. Three themes were identified through thematic analysis and reflected issues pertaining to: (a) understanding whistleblowing, (b) facilitating factors and barriers to whistleblowing, and (c) aspects of a reliable and transparent reporting system. Our findings corroborate previous research on whistleblowing against doping in sport, and provide novel insights about the beliefs, attitudes, and concerns of sport stakeholders, such as coaches and sport directors, about the feasibility of existing whistleblowing policies and processes. The policy and practice implications of our findings are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Reporting doping
• irregularities
• corruption
• integrity

Acknowledgements

The study was financially supported by the Cyprus Anti-Doping Authority as part of a larger scale project “The CyADA Whistleblowing Study”. The authors wish to express their gratitude to all the participants who voluntarily committed their time and disclosed their lived experience and beliefs towards whistleblowing.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Cyprus Anti-Doping Authority: [Grant Number 1].