The Role of Perceived Leadership Behaviors as Predictor of Assertiveness Levels in Individual Sport Athletes

Abstract

The aim of this research was to investigate the role of athletes’ perception of coaches’ leadership behavior as predictor of athletes’ assertiveness in individual sport. 239 individual sport athletes (Xage=20.79±3.32) voluntarily participated to the research. The participants consisted of 170 male (71,1%) and 69 female (28.9%) athletes from various individual sports such as wrestling, athletics, weightlifting, taekwondo, boxing, karate, badminton etc. The data were collected using a personal information form, Leadership Scale for Sport and Rathus Assertiveness Schedule. Descriptive statistics, Pearson's correlation analysis and hierarchical multiple regression analysis were used in SPSS 17. p<.05 was determined as the statistical significance value. Results showed that there were positive significant correlations between the subscales of Leadership Scale for Sports (Training and instruction behavior, democraticbehavior, social support behavior and positive feedback behavior) and assertiveness. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was used to assess the ability of leadership behaviors to predict assertiveness scores of the athletes after controlling for the influence of age and gender. The model explained an additional 21% variance in assertiveness after controlling for age and gender, R square change = .21, F change (5, 231) = 12.833, p<.05). It appeared in the final model that training and instruction behavior (β= .45, p<.05) and autocratic behavior (β= -.17, p<.05) were statistically significant. The results indicated that training and instruction behavior of sport coaches could positively contribute to assertiveness score whereas autocratic behavior seems to undermine it in individual sport athletes.