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a r t i c l e
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Article history:
Received 17 June 2013
Received in revised form 23 November 2013
Accepted 29 November 2013
Available online 25 December 2013
Keywords:
Mental toughness
Latent mean analysis
Sport participation
Persistence
Exercise
Physical activity
a b s t r a c t
The aim of this study was to investigate the higher-order structure of mental toughness and to examine
differences in mental toughness between athletes and non-athletes. Participants of this study 927 athletes and 931 non-athletes completed a battery of questionnaires designed to assess four characteristics
of mental toughness: hope, optimism, perseverance and resilience. The higher-order structure of mental
toughness was found to be the same for both athletes and non-athletes. The latent mean differences analyses showed that athletes scored higher in mental toughness when compared to non-athletes. Taken
together, these ndings support the theoretical assumption that mental toughness is a higher-order
construct encompassing different characteristics and that sport participation is associated with higher
mental toughness.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Mental toughness has been dened as a collection of values,
attitudes, emotions, and cognitions that inuence the way in which
an individual approaches, responds to, and appraises demanding
events to consistently achieve his or her goals (Gucciardi, Gordon,
& Dimmock, 2009, p. 54). It is a concept that was developed within
the setting of sport psychology and it refers to what we usually call
the higher mental abilities of an athlete (Crust, 2008). However,
the question of whether athletes differ from non-athletes regarding their mental toughness still needs to be answered.
Gucciardi et al. (2009) suggest that mental toughness is more a
function of environment than domains, and as such, mental toughness is potentially important in any environment that requires performance setting, challenges, and adversities, i.e., business, the
military, and medicine. Two recent studies examined mental
toughness in a non-sport sample (Gerber et al., 2013a, 2013b),
however no comparison was made with athletes. In addition, those
two studies made the assumption that the structure of mental
toughness was similar in athletes and non-athletes without verifying this supposition. In summary, mental toughness has almost
Corresponding author. Address: DSHS (Deutsche Sporthochschule), Institute of
Psychology, Am. Sportpark Mngersdorf 6, 50933 Cologne, Germany. Tel.: +49 221
49 82 56 90.
E-mail address: [email protected] (S. Laborde).
1
The authors contributed equally to this work.
0191-8869/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2013.11.019
31
32
Table 1
Descriptive Statistics of means, standard deviations of all dimensions and subdimensions.
Variables
HOPE total
HOPE agency subscale
HOPE pathway subscale
LOT-R total
LOT-R positivism
LOT-R pessimism
Persistence total
Persistence eagerness of effort
Persistence work hardened
Persistence ambitious
Persistence perfectionist
Resilience total
Athletes (n = 927)
Non-athletes (n = 931)
Male (n = 441)
Female (n = 486)
Total
Male (n = 464)
Female (n = 467)
Total
SD
SD
SD
SD
SD
SD
6.63
6.57
6.69
3.69
4.00
2.62
3.60
3.26
3.79
3.75
3.59
5.88
0.79
0.84
0.94
0.63
0.69
0.93
0.50
0.56
0.63
0.63
0.58
0.59
6.59
6.56
6.63
3.63
3.91
2.66
3.57
3.29
3.77
3.65
3.57
5.84
0.80
0.86
0.89
0.61
0.66
0.86
0.49
0.59
0.56
0.62
0.58
0.57
6.61
6.57
6.66
3.66
3.96
2.64
3.58
3.28
3.78
3.70
3.58
5.86
0.79
0.85
0.91
0.62
0.68
0.89
0.49
0.58
0.59
0.63
0.58
0.58
6.19
6.07
6.31
3.47
3.70
2.77
3.20
2.90
3.36
3.33
3.20
5.50
0.90
0.94
1.02
0.68
0.74
0.89
0.56
0.67
0.63
0.63
0.65
0.70
6.29
6.19
6.40
3.50
3.73
2.74
3.23
3.01
3.42
3.31
3.20
5.61
0.85
0.91
0.98
0.58
0.70
0.79
0.53
0.63
0.63
0.63
0.63
0.64
6.24
6.13
6.35
3.48
3.72
2.76
3.21
2.96
3.39
3.32
3.20
5.56
0.87
0.93
1.00
0.64
0.72
0.84
0.55
0.65
0.63
0.63
0.64
0.67
Note: LOT-R: Life Orientation Test-Revised (i.e., instrument assessing optimism), Persistence: Dimension of the temperament and character inventory-revised assessing
perseverance in our study.
items. Of the six items, three are coded in a positive direction, and
three are coded in a negative direction. Sample item: In uncertain
times, I usually expect the best. Respondents are asked to indicate
the extent to which they agree with each of the items using the
following scale: 4 = strongly agree, 3 = agree, 2 = neutral,
1 = disagree, and 0 = strongly disagree. Cronbachs alpha in our
study was found to be .74.
e1
e2
Hope
Optimism
Mental Toughness
2.2.3. Resilience
To measure resilience we used the short form Resilience Scale
(RS-15, Wagnild & Young, 1993), which contains 15 items. Sample
item is: I do not dwell on things that I cant do anything about.
Participants had to rate the items on a Likert-scale from 1 = disagree to 7 = agree. Cronbachs alpha in our study was .85.
e3
e4
2.2.4. Perseverance
Persistence was assessed with one of the dimensions of the
Temperament and Character Inventory-Revised (TCI-R, Cloninger
et al., 1994). The persistence subscale consists of four dimensions
and 35 items, which the participant has to answer with a Likert-scale
from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. Sample item: I
am often so determined that I continue working long after other people have given up. Cronbachs alpha in our study was .88.
2.3. Procedures
Athletes and non-athletes were given a brief description of the
study and given the opportunity to participate. Consent was obtained from all participants prior to commencing the study. Participants were asked to complete the battery of psychological
assessments in a single 25-min session. The study received the approval of the Ethics Committee of the local university.
Perseverance
Resilience
We tested the hypothesized model (see Fig. 1) for invariance between athletes and non-athletes. First, the congural invariance
model yielded good indices of t: v2 = 14.310, DF = 4, p = .006;
CFI = .99; RMSEA = .04. Second, the metric invariance model also
showed very good indices of t: v2 = 30.394, DF = 7, p < .001,
CFI = .99, RMSEA = .04. As the CFI change between the models representing congural and metric invariance was lower than 0.01, we
could assume factor loading invariance between athletes and nonathletes. Third, the scalar invariance model showed an important
drop in goodness of t, making it unacceptable: v2: 252.501,
33
.06
.08
.03
.04
.02
.02
.05
.03
.04
.25*
.24*
.27*
.30
.07
.04
.03
.08
.27*
.69*
.02
.03
.03
.06
.02
.84*
.08
.13*
.07
.13*
.12*
.06
.07
.03
.12*
.06
.02
.01
.01
.03
.37*
.55*
.64*
10
11
.53*
.08
.21*
0
.03
.03
.06
.14*
.06
.10
.16*
.33*
.41*
Note: Sport type: Individual (1) or team sport (2); LOT-R: Life Orientation Test-Revised (i.e., instrument assessing optimism), Persistence: Dimension of the temperament and
character inventory-revised assessing perseverance in our study.
p < .001.
0;
1
0;
Hope
e1
1
e11
P (in years)
0;
1
e10
0;
e8
1
1
P (min per week)
Optimism
0;
1
e6
Mental Toughness
0;
1
Age
0;
1
e9
e2
e7
0;
0;
1
Perseverance
e3
1
0;
e5
Type of sport
0;
1
Resilience
e4
DF = 11, p < .001, CFI = .90, RMSEA = .12. As it is not possible to assess latent means with condence if the scalar structure is not
invariant, we checked for partial scalar invariance, as recommended by Byrne (2009). The results support partial scalar invariance as the t of the latter model and the t of the metric model
did not vary signicantly (DCFI < .01), obtaining the following values: v2: 67.923, DF = 9, p < .001, CFI = .98, RMSEA = .05. As partial
scalar invariance was supported, it is now possible to interpret latent mean differences with condence. We chose non-athletes to
serve as a reference group and athletes as a comparison group.
The mean was set to 0 in the reference group (i.e., non-athletes),
and to vary freely in the comparison group (athletes). The results
showed a critical ratio (CR) value of 5.912, indicating a signicant
difference in mental toughness between athletes and non-athletes.
The positive CR value suggests that the comparison group (i.e., athletes) has higher latent mean values than the reference group (i.e.,
non-athletes). In order to calculate the effect size, we followed the
recommendations of Kline (1998), who suggested to compute a Cohens d statistic in order to obtain an effect size index for latent
mean differences. The unstandardized mean for athletes was
0.37, and the standard deviations were of 0.06 and 0.08 respectively for athletes and non-athletes. The effect size obtained is
equal to 1.42, which represents a large effect size according to
Cohens guidelines (Cohen, 1988).
4. Discussion
The main aim of this study was to examine whether athletes
and non-athletes differ regarding their mental toughness, investigating rst the higher-order structure of mental toughness based
34
,64
Hope
e1
,80
,24
Optimism
,00
e6
,06
,16
Mental Toughness
,45
,67
Perseverance
,00,18
e7
e2
,49
e3
,80
Age
e5
,65
Resilience
e4
on four key characteristics. The hypothesized higher-order structure across samples of mental toughness was supported by our results, in line with the theoretical assumption that mental
toughness represents a higher-order construct based on several
characteristics. To date, the characteristics of mental toughness
had been established in two ways: by interviews (e.g., Fourie &
Potgieter, 2001; Jones et al., 2002), which remain somewhat anecdotal; and by correlations with mental toughness inventories (e.g.,
Nicholls et al., 2008), which were developed not so much on specic theories, but rather on assumptions related to the aforementioned interview studies. Choosing to adopt a different approach,
we evaluated the extent to which dimensions related to a soundly
established theoretical perspective of mental toughness (Gucciardi
et al., 2009) could actually be integrated into a higher-order
dimension. This approach, which is based on well-established psychological constructs (i.e., hope, optimism, perseverance, resilience), strengthened the rationale of mental toughness reecting
the ability of an individual to thrive through both the positive
and negative situations that one has to face (Gucciardi et al., 2009).
The latent mean differences analysis demonstrated that athletes
scored higher than non-athletes on mental toughness, with a large
effect size. This result is in line with the fact that higher mental
toughness levels are usually associated with higher sport performance (Gucciardi & Gordon, 2011). Each of the characteristics integrated to the higher-order construct of mental toughness is
thought to play a role in this direction. Firstly, for hope, Curry,
Snyder, Cook, Ruby, and Rehm (1997) demonstrated that athletes
had higher dispositional hope than non-athletes, and that dispositional hope was also found to inuence sport performance (Curry
et al., 1997). Secondly, for optimism, Kavussanu and McAuley
(1995) found that participants involved in physical activity were
more optimistic and less pessimistic. Thirdly, for perseverance, this
is, to the best of our knowledge, the rst time that the comparison
athletes/non-athletes has been explored in the literature. Perseverance is an intrinsic part of sport: previous research by FraserThomas and Ct (2009) showed that sport requires perseverance
and also that sport offers a specic environment that rewards
perseverance. Fourthly, regarding resilience, to the best of our
knowledge no studies investigated differences between athletes
and non-athletes. It seems that it is possible to develop resilience
(Padesky & Mooney, 2012), and sport may provide an adequate
environment in which to develop resilience, precisely because it
presents athletes with a range of negative events (e.g., competition
stress, failures, injuries).
the idea that sport participation could be associated to the development of mental toughness. Finally, future studies aiming to
understand how mental toughness develops should also aim to
clarify its cognitive underpinning mechanisms (Dewhurst,
Anderson, Cotter, Crust, & Clough, 2012) as well as its links with
performance, like it was done with other individual differences
such as trait emotional intelligence (e.g., Laborde, Lautenbach,
Allen, Herbert, & Achtzehn, 2014).
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