Collective Cohesion and Team Effi cacy in the Preparation Period and Team Performance

Abstract

The aim of the study was to verify to what extent the eff ectiveness of sports teams throughout the season is conditioned by group processes, especially group cohesion and a sense of team effi cacy. Measurements of the analysed group processes were performed before the beginning of the main season, which allowed to obtain an answer to the question as to whether the level of group cohesion and the sense of team effi cacy developed before the start of league games is signifi cantly correlated with the team’s successes throughout the season proper. The study comprised 28 teams from 2 disciplines: basketball and volleyball. Both women and men participated in the study. Group cohesion was evaluated with the Polish version of the Group Environment Questionnaire (Polish adaptation according to Krawczyński, 1995), and the sense of team effi cacy was assessed with the Team Eff ectiveness Questionnaire (Polish version by Wałach-Biśta, 2015). The obtained results of simple regression analysis showed that the sense of team effi cacy is a signifi cant, strong and positive predictor of eff ectiveness on the pitch, both in women’s and men’s teams. Further analyses have indicated that the gender of athletes is a signifi cant moderator of the relationship between group cohesion in the GIS dimension (group social integration) and team performance. Hierarchical regression analysis demonstrated that gender, GIS, and gender interaction with GIS explain 20.2% of the variance regarding the dependent variable: effi ciency; and the overall model is statistically signifi cant (F(3, 24) = 3.28; p < 0.05). On the other hand, correlation analyses showed that in the men’s teams, along with the increase in social group integration, group eff ectiveness also signifi cantly increased (r = 0.436; p < 0.05). In the women’s teams, the correlation turned out to be signifi cant at the level of the statistical tendency, and the relationship between group eff ectiveness and the level of group social integration turned out to be negative and moderately strong (r = -0.432; p < 0.07).