Coach Commitment and Burnout: A One-Year Follow-Up

Abstract

This study is a one-year follow-up to Raedeke, Granzyk, and Warren's (2000) study on coach burnout from a commitment perspective and was designed to examine whether changes in the theoretical determinants of commitment related to changes in the exhaustion dimension of burnout and commitment level. For this study, 141 swim coaches completed a mail survey two-times one year apart that assessed commitment determinants (i.e., satisfaction, benefits, costs, investments, alternative options, and social constraints), feelings of exhaustion, and commitment. Based on static scores, results revealed that a majority (64%) of coaches were assigned to the same commitment profile at Time 1 and Time 2. From a longitudinal perspective, cluster analysis revealed three coach profiles reflecting increasing attraction to coaching, increasing signs of entrapment, and decreasing coaching interest based on commitment model variables. Subsequent MANOVA results revealed a cluster by time interaction for both exhaustion and commitment. Coaches with characteristics suggesting increased entrapment showed the largest increase in exhaustion whereas those with decreased coaching interest had the lowest commitment.

The author would like to thank USA Swimming for supporting this study and all the coaches who graciously gave their time to complete the questionnaires.

Notes

¹A complete description of each scale and results from Time 1 questionnaire administration are reported in Raedeke et al. (2000) and Raedeke, Warren, and Granzyk (2002).

² To compare exhaustion levels to established norms, the mean exhaustion score was multiplied by the number of items (i.e., 9). Maslach et al. (1996) established population norms by grouping scores into thirds on the exhaustion dimension that include low, ≤16; average, 17 to 26; and high ≥27 scores.

³All univariate and post-hoc comparisons were tested at the alpha = .01 level to help control familywise error rate.

⁴ Cluster analysis was also conducted using seed points of +/−1. This analysis revealed results identical to those reported in this study. Moreover, to examine cluster stability through cross-validation, cluster analysis was rerun three times sampling 75% of the cases each time. In each case, all but 15–16 individuals were assigned to the same cluster.

⁵Given that the mean exhaustion scores were fairly low, it is possible that coaching status (i.e., part versus full-time) differences existed on exhaustion. For part-time coaches, coaching may not have been their primary occupation and perhaps even provided “diversion” from their primary occupation. Consequently, it is plausible that part-time youth sport coaches did not experience the same exhaustion level as full-time coaches. Preliminary exploratory analyses revealed that no significant differences existed between full- and part-time coaches on burnout at either Time 1 or Time 2. The fact that many of the sampled coaches were part-time status cannot completely explain the relatively low exhaustion scores found in this study.