Beyond the technical: The role of emotion regulation in lacrosse officiating

ABSTRACT

Emotions can influence the performance of referees leading to a need to examine emotions experienced, and regulation strategies used by referees. The present study assessed emotions and emotion regulation strategies of 19 referees officiating at an Under-19 Lacrosse World Championship. Using survey methods and focus group interviews, officials responded to five questions: (a) What emotions were experienced? (b) What events elicited emotions? (c) How did lacrosse officials manage their own emotional states prior to, throughout, and following a competitive game? (d) How did officials manage others’ emotional states? (e) What were the perceived consequences of these strategies? Results indicate that emotions fluctuated throughout the tournament as referees encountered intrapersonal and interpersonal emotion-eliciting events. These fluctuations are suggested to come from a progressively diminished capacity for emotion regulation. Participants used emotion regulation strategies that could be classified into Gross’ (1999) families of emotion regulation strategies, often relying on suppression, emotion contagion, and preventative refereeing. Collectively, the results offer new insights into referee emotion regulation at international events.

KEYWORDS:

• Emotion contagion
• preventative refereeing
• umpires
• psychological skills
• decision-making

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to gratefully acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC; RES-060-25-0044: “Emotion regulation of others and self [EROS])”.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The authors would like to gratefully acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC; RES-060-25-0044: “Emotion regulation of others and self [EROS])”.