Pre-competitve mood states in adolescents in team sports and satisfaction with performance

Abstract

This research was driven by Lane and Terry’s (2000) theoretical model, and was carried out with the aim of studying the profile of mood states in adolescent athletes, in addition to the relationship between mood dimensions and sports performance. 212 athletes (82.5% men, 17.5% women) with an average age of 15.44 (SD = 1.14) took part. All of them completed the POMS questionnaire on mood states and 2 subjective performance indicators. On the basis of scores on Depressed Mood, the sample of participants was divided up into 2 groups, Non-Depressed (n = 104) and Depressed (n = 108). The Depressed group reported significantly higher values for Tension, Anger, and Fatigue, and significantly lower values for Vigour. with respect to the size of the correlations amongst factors, the overall coefficient was higher in the Depressed-mood group, although the difference observed was not statistically significant. Finally, we found significant relationships between the POMS Friendship factor and satisfaction with performance in the Non-Depressed group.