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Here we are in Week 6

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Here we are in Week 6. The idea behind this assignment is to acquaint you with ideas and mechanisms to help individuals learn and increase their motivation to learn. We're going to do that through a literature review. Here you will select five scholarly or empirical articles: What that means is that they are NOT WEBSITES, NOT TEXTS, but journal articles and they have been presented in what we would call a refereed journal. Typically, a refereed journal can begin with The Journal of Sport Psychology, but not always. A referred journal is one which the author(s) has submitted an article for publication to a review board. That board then reviews the article and votes it in or out of a particular journal, thereby increasing the authenticity, strength, and reliability to the article.

I'm asking that you select five articles in the learning and motivation area that speak to a specific motivational/learning issue. For example, perhaps you're working with some individual who needs to lose weight or needs to gain a specific amount of strength, or learn a new skill or improve one they have already learned. Choose one specific situation or Skill, then, select five empirical articles that relate to this situation/skill and create an annotated bibliography about each article. Now remember: when you create an annotated bibliography, the reference leads prior to the summary. So, for example, with your first article: state the reference in APA format, then follow with a summary. You do this for article #2, #3, #4 and #5. Finally, create a comprehensive, overall summary. Typically, an annotated bibliography would be 1 - 2 pages.

Title: Week Two Assignment: Learning and Motivation 100 pts.

Due Date: End of Week 6

 (text for video is located at the bottom of the page)

After thoroughly reviewing readings, lecture notes, and websites, complete the following assignment:

Annotated Bibliography within Sport Psychology


Purpose: The purpose of this assignment is to expose students to a psychological skills topic of Learning and Motivation. You are asked to obtain five empirical articles directly related to learning and motivation. For each article, write an annotated bibliography, thus reading and reporting on the article in great depth. Finally, integrate the findings from the annotated bibliography into a summary report detailing the current state of knowledge on learning and motivation

Process:

-Select a psychological skills topic dealing with Learning and Motivation

-Locate five empirical studies from Scholarly journal articles only, not websites, which test principles related to that topic
(articles should be recent; 1995 to present time)

-For each selected article, write a one-page annotated bibliography,
You must begin with the APA reference, then write the summary including purpose, hypotheses sample,
measures, procedures, design, statistical results, interpretation of
results, practical implications, and scholarly implications

-Summarize the findings from the five sources through the writing of a
brief report detailing the results gleaned on the topic (integrate the
results; do not simply write five separate summaries)

-Make sure you document each article using APA style of referencing……

Please let me know if you have any questions.

The length of this assignment should be 6 pages plus a title and reference page.

EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGIST, 45(1), 28–36, 2010 C Division 15, American Psychological Association Copyright ISSN: 0046-1520 print / 1532-6985 online DOI: 10.1080/00461520903433596 The Development of an Attribution-Based Theory of Motivation: A History of Ideas Bernard Weiner Department of Psychology University of California, Los Angeles The history of ideas guiding the development of an attribution-based theory of motivation is presented. These influences include the search for a “grand” theory of motivation (from drive and expectancy/value theory), an attempt to represent how the past may influence the present and the future (as Thorndike accomplished), and the incorporation of causes and their properties (from Heider and Rotter). The goal of this approach is the formulation of a conception in which causes influence action via the mediating mechanisms of specific affects (as first suggested by Atkinson) and expectancy. The empirical and conceptual contributions of the theory are summarized. Thank you so much for selecting me to receive the E. L. Thorndike Research Award for Career Achievement. It is a wonderful honor that I cherish. This is actually my fourth connection or association with Dr. Thorndike. The first occurred prior to my PhD, when I was a graduate student. In my era, there was a foreign language obligation for graduate students. To pass this requirement, students were given 1 hr to translate a previously unseen article in their chosen field. My foreign language was German, and my exam article happened to be written by Thorndike. I flunked badly and spent the next 3 months ignoring my dissertation and studying nothing but German. To facilitate my progress, I read Thorndike’s publication in English. However, I could not understand a word of it; any translation was doomed to end badly. The doorway into attribution theory was opened because I ascribed my misfortune to him. This language failure elicited frustration, anger, and fear regarding the next exam—emotions automatically aroused whenever I saw Thorndike’s name or even his initials. But now, with this award, all negative associations are masked or removed and the letters E. L. in themselves elicit joy, pride, and gratitude. My second association with Thorndike awaited the reception of my PhD. I became aware that the two of us share an academic heritage—we are both students of William James. As shown in Figure 1, Thorndike completed his dissertation under the direction of James. I also trace my academic lineage to William James, although there are a number Correspondence should be addressed to Bernard Weiner, Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, 405 South Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1563. E-mail: Weiner@psych.ucla.edu of intermediate figures, starting with G. Stanley Hall, the first American Psychological Association president, and ending with my direct mentor, John Atkinson (although I fudged somewhat on Donald Marquis, who did begin his graduate career at Stanford with Terman but completed his PhD at Yale). I initially feared being disqualified from the award because of my kinship with Thorndike. Thankfully, this association did not influence the award committee. I present my remaining connection with Thorndike, which came while I was contributing to attribution theory, quite soon. THE “GRAND” THEORIES OF MOTIVATION My research career owes a great deal to my mentor, John. W. Atkinson. Atkinson took part in the pursuit of a “grand theory” of motivation. This goal characterized the study of motivation for about half a century, roughly from 1930 to 1970. For the experimental motivation psychologist, the aim was to identify the determinants of action and specify their mathematical and/or sequential (temporal) relations. The most influential of these approaches is associated with Clark Hull and Kenneth Spence (Hull, 1943; Spence, 1956), the prime creators of drive theory. This conception specifies that behavior is determined by Drive × Habit and an array of other factors, including incentives. Motivated behavior was thought to depend on the magnitude of bodily needs multiplied by the strength of pertinent behavioral patterns that had been strengthened by rewards. ATTRIBUTION-BASED THEORY OF MOTIVATION William James E. L. Thorndike G. Stanley Hall E.C. Sanford Lewis Terman Donald Marquis John Atkinson Bernard Weiner FIGURE 1 Academic lineage linking E. L. Thorndike and this author. A competing theoretical approach was linked to Edward Tolman (1932), Julian Rotter (1954), and Atkinson (1957), who instead argued that behavior is directed by Expectancy × Value and, for Atkinson, motives as well. That is, what one does depends on what one is going to get multiplied by the subjective likelihood of getting it. Kurt Lewin (1938), who also partially embraced expectancy/value theory, additionally proposed a temporal order between the behavioral determinants. He postulated that an object acquires a valance, and therefore motivational properties, only after there is a need within the organism. This results in a motivation sequence of: need → incentive (valence) → force (behavioral tendency). For example, for a hungry individual food takes on a positive quality, which in turn generates forces on the person to approach that incentive. These theories were presumed to account for all behavior, regardless of content domain. Hence, they are called “grand,” perhaps a shortened version of grandiose, for their aspirations were formidable and their hopes embraced a unifying theory of motivation. It is reasonable to maintain that Einstein was the guiding light, with recognition of some limitations imposed by animate as opposed to inanimate objects of study. Indeed, while I was a graduate student, Atkinson was immersed in Isaac Newton and incorporated Newton’s principles of motion into motivation theory (see Atkinson & Birch, 1970). Some current motivational theories (e.g., the self-efficacy approach) share this inclusive goal but without mathematical representation or specification of multiple determinants of action. My particular version of attribution theory also is guided by the grand views. I specify the determinants of behavior (as the drive and expectancy/value theorists) and identify their sequential arrangement (as did Lewin), albeit without mathematical assumptions regarding the relation of the component parts and with causal beliefs as the theoretical bedrock. 29 This theory has other historical influences as well, and here I return to Thorndike. Thorndike’s (1911) often-cited Law of Effect states that behaviors previously rewarded will be repeated, whereas those that were punished will be avoided or extinguished. That is, Thorndike pointed out a motivational sequence takes place over time and a critical issue is how to represent the past so it may influence the present and the future. As an attribution theorist, I also focus on how the past makes it way into the present and future. But rather than having reinforcement or past hedonism as the bridging mechanism, I contend that the interpretation of the past, that is, the perceived causes of prior events, determines what will be done in the future. Inferences regarding why one was rewarded or punished, or phenomenal causality, and not outcomes per se are proposed to direct behavior. Hence, both reward and punishment can have positive or negative motivational consequences depending on the perceived causes of those outcomes. THEORETICAL BEGINNINGS I now return to my mentor, John Atkinson, and more specifically examine the historical influences on the development of attribution theory. Atkinson’s (1957) conception of motivation, which initially guided my thinking, includes three principles not shared by other expectancy/value theorists including Tolman (1932) and Rotter (1954): 1. Motivation is also determined by individual differences (motives), so that Atkinson’s equation for strength of motivation is Motive × Expectancy × Value. The motive he primarily embraced was the need for achievement. 2. Incentive (value) is conceptualized as an affect, pride in accomplishment (here I consider only approach motivation and positive affect). Thus, affects other than general pleasure/pain were incorporated into the conception. 3. Incentive (value) is inversely related to expectancy of success so that pride is presumed to be greater given success at a difficult task (low expectancy of success) than at an easy task (high expectancy of success). A number of perils awaited me as I continued in this research tradition after finally passing the German exam. First, achievement needs were assessed with a projective instrument, the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT). Then, those designated as high or low in achievement needs were called back for an experimental manipulation, typically success or failure at tasks that varied in subjective difficulty. But scoring and motive classification decisions required a great deal of effort and by the time the individual difference assessment was completed, some participants had fulfilled their experimental requirements. Others would not take part in the second phase of the research. One consequence of this procedure and the loss of subjects was that it was not possible to 30 WEINER complete many experiments, a vulnerable starting point for an assistant professor. Further, in spite of the “grand” foundation, Atkinson’s theory was restricted in its predictions (which was also true for drive theory). The main theoretically generated hypothesis was that individuals high in achievement needs are especially attracted to intermediate difficulty tasks relative to persons low in achievement needs. Unfortunately, this and other hypotheses related to motive-group differences often were not confirmed in experimental studies (see review in Weiner, 1992). In short, I had reason to fear the outcome of any later tenure decision. I therefore began to search for other predictors and predictions and more economical experimental procedures, hoping to increase my research output. About then, Julian Rotter (1966) published a monograph examining a concept labeled “locus of control” and its possible designation as a trait. I was previously unaware of this body of research, which examined the effects of success and failure at skill versus chance tasks on subsequent expectancies. It seemed logical to pursue the idea that persons with high achievement needs view the world as controllable by them (i.e., outcomes are determined by skill) more so than do persons low in achievement needs, who might perceive luck (external control) as the major determinant of their success and failure. I devised a correlation study to test these ideas, administering achievement and locus of control measures to a large subject population (Weiner & Potepan, 1970). This yielded what I then regarded as promising findings. Thus, two measures (the TAT and locus of control scale) and two constructs (need for achievement and locus of control) that I now question launched my research in attribution theory. Further consideration of the locus of control construct and measure gave rise to a number of concerns, just as I had been uneasy about the concept of need for achievement and the TAT assessment instrument. For example, if one fails because of a perceived lack of aptitude, then the causal locus is internal yet not subject to volitional control. That is, there can be internality without control. In addition, if one succeeds at a task because of perceived high ability, then subsequent failure at that or a similar task would not be ascribed to low ability. But this is not the case given effort as the perceived cause—success or failure at the same task could be regarded as due to the degree of effort expenditure. Furthermore, the magnitude or likelihood of the perceived determinants of success differ from those of failure—evidence of personal enhancement is pervasive so that success more than failure elicits beliefs that the self played a role, whereas failure more than success gives rise to external causal beliefs. In sum, distinctions between locus and control, ability and effort, and success and failure must be made when considering causal ascriptions. These conclusions promoted my skepticism that locus of control is a trait and/or a unitary construct (just as I doubted the trait designation of need for achievement inasmuch as one could be highly motivated, for example, when playing tennis but not ping-pong). Again I faced an uncertain future. THEORETICAL DEVELOPMENT I then belatedly (around 1968) rediscovered attribution theory and Fritz Heider. I had skimmed Heider’s (1958) book while a graduate student but did not take his “common sense” approach seriously. After all, while Atkinson was studying Newton and considering inertial tendencies in human behavior, Heider was citing Shakespeare and Ibsen and building his analyses on the everyday vocabulary of laypersons. He wondered what would have happened had Juliet’s parents liked Romeo, or Romeo’s parents liked Juliet, “thought experiments” that generated ideas for balance theory. But reading Heider once again with the background knowledge of Rotter’s research and my thoughts separating locus from control, ability from effort, and success from failure now placed his ideas within a more compatible framework. In Heider’s naive analysis of action, outcomes are ascribed to Can × Try. Note that this is not a theory of motivation—it contains, for example, neither needs, incentives nor emotions. It is, rather, an analysis of the determinants of success and failure. Can, in turn, captures the relation of ability to the difficulty of the task. Thus, Heider identified three determinants of performance: ability, task difficulty, and effort. Two of these (ability and effort) he regarded as internal to the actor, whereas task difficulty is an external cause of an outcome. Heider and Rotter did not cite one another, although both were concerned with the perceived causes of success and failure and their locus or location. Rotter acknowledged one internal and one external cause, respectively, skill (ability) and luck (chance), whereas Heider intuited three causes (ability, effort, and task difficulty). I combined these two lists and proposed four main perceived causes of achievement outcomes—ability, effort, task difficulty, and luck (see Weiner et al., 1971). Two of these are internal to the person (ability and effort) and two are external (task difficulty and luck). It had taken me about 3 years to reach this very simple formulation! Causal Consequences Four causes had now been identified and classified according to their location within or outside of the person. But what might be the motivational implications of this approach? Within Rotter’s expectancy/value framework, locus of control is related to expectancy of success, with greater expectancy shifts (increments after success, decrements following failure) anticipated given internal rather than external control beliefs. For example, greater increments in expectancy of success were expected following a decisive win at a tennis match (a skill task) than at a coin toss (a chance task), and ATTRIBUTION-BASED THEORY OF MOTIVATION similarly greater decrements in expectancy were anticipated following a clear loss at tennis than at a coin toss (the words decisive and clear were included to preclude the outcome being ascribed to luck). Yet closer examination of these predicted associations once again raised doubts about Rotter’s analysis of causal locus. For example, if an exam is failed because the teacher is extremely harsh, expectancies may fall although the cause is external to the student, just as they had been hypothesized to drop when failure is attributed to the internal cause of low ability. Furthermore, if failure is ascribed to lack of studying and the student wants to do better in the future, then expectancy of success may not drop even though effort is an internal cause, just as expectancy had been anticipated to remain relatively unchanged when failure is ascribed to the external cause of bad luck. That is, locus of control is not systematically related to expectancy and expectancy shifts because some internal causes of failure lead to large expectancy decreases (e.g., low ability), whereas others do not (e.g., lack of effort), just as some external ascriptions for failure produce substantial expectancy decrements (e.g., a harsh teacher), whereas others have little affect on subjective likelihood (e.g., bad luck). Could there be a property or characteristic of causes other than locus that accounts for expectancy shifts? I argued this property is causal stability (see Weiner et al., 1971), a characteristic of causes that Heider (1958) acknowledged but had not elaborated. If a cause is subject to future change, such as lack of effort (internal to the person) or bad luck (external causality), then failure would not produce downward shifts in expectancy—hope could be maintained. On the other hand, if the cause of failure is regarded as unchanging or stable, such as aptitude (internal) or a rigid teacher (external), then there would be an expectation of future failure and a state of hopelessness. Causal stability, I concluded, rather than causal locus, is the basis of expectancy shifts. Simply put, if the cause will prevail in the future, then the prior effect will be anticipated to recur regardless of causal locus, whereas if the cause could change, then so might the outcome (see Weiner, Nierenberg, & Goldstein, 1976). In this manner I bridged the past to the future, as Thorndike had accomplished using reinforcement principles. But what, then, is the function or the consequence of causal locus? Here I returned to expectancy/value theory for a clue. If expectancy is accounted for by causal stability, then only the value (incentive) component of expectancy/value theory, which I had not abandoned, remained to be linked to causal ascriptions. Guided by Atkinson’s belief that the incentive of achievement performance is a desired affective experience of pride, it was reasoned that attributions of success to internal factors give rise to more pride than do external ascriptions. One therefore feels greater pride after success at a tennis match attributed to high ability or high effort than following success at a coin toss perceived as due to good luck. 31 Difficult task --------------------------------------- High pride Internal causal locus for the success Easy task -------------------------------------------- Low pride External causal locus for the success FIGURE 2 Relation between task difficulty and pride mediated by perceptions of causality (causal locus). A locus-pride relation leads to the suggestion that perception of causal locus is the mediator accounting for Atkinson’s assumption and the supporting data that pride is related to task difficulty. The harder the task, the more likely that success is ascribed to the self (rather than to the ease of the task) and thus the greater the pride in accomplishment. Or, stated somewhat differently, success at a difficult task is inconsistent with social norms and hence results in an internal ascription and high pride, whereas success at an easy task is consistent with social norms and thus gives rise to an external task attribution and low pride, as depicted in Figure 2. INITIAL CONCEPTUAL PROPOSAL This line of reasoning resulted in Figure 3 (see Weiner et al., 1971), which is a 2 × 2 representation including four determinants of behavioral outcomes (ability, effort, task difficulty, and luck), their two causal properties or dimensions (locus and stability), and the linkages of value (incentive, affect) to causal locus and expectancy to causal stability. Figure 3 reveals that when Rotter compared expectancy changes following success or failure given ability (internal and stable causality) versus luck (external and unstable causality) beliefs, two dimensions or properties of phenomenal causality (locus and stability) were confounded. Rotter had incorrectly related expectancy to causal locus rather than to causal stability. The simple structure shown in Figure 3 provided a guide for my thinking and was the foundation for subsequent theory building. In addition, the structure captures the three phases in the evolution of scientific explanation: description (the listing of four causes), followed by classification or taxonomy (the two dimensions of causality), and finally a conceptual representation of the determinants of action (linking the dimensions to expectancy and value). A more complete theory, I believed, needed to specify the antecedents that influence causal beliefs; identify other perceived causes as well as additional properties or dimensions of causes; and discover the connection between these dimensions and expectancy, affect, and other determinants of motivated behavior. In addition, there had to be more concern about the action itself, operationalized with the usual 32 WEINER Causal Locus Internal Ability Stable External Task Difficulty Expectancy Causal Stability Unstable Effort Luck Value (Pride) FIGURE 3 Representation of the four main causes of behavior, their dimensional properties (locus and stability), and linkages to affect and expectancy. motivational indicators of choice, intensity, and persistence of behavior, as shown in Figure 4. In sum, I had now developed the scaffold for a structure than transcends content domains, includes interrelated component parts and provides a temporal sequence for a motivational episode. These were the goals of the grand theorists. Furthermore, the heart of expectancy/value theory was retained (see Weiner, 1985, 1986). Later in my career, I left this foundation when exploring social motivation (Weiner, 2006), but that story is not included here. THEORETICAL ELABORATION I then proceeded to amend the structure in Figure 4 by “filling in the blanks.” Perhaps the most important addition was to include a third causal dimension, causal control, to join locus and stability. Recall it was earlier reasoned that locus and control must be separated because, for example, aptitude is an internal but uncontrollable determinant of achievement outcomes. The control construct created some difficulties in that it did not appear to be orthogonal to locus. An external cause by definition is not controllable by the actor, whereas some internal causes are controllable (the most important Outcome Causal Antecedents being effort), whereas others are not (e.g., height as the cause of success or failure at basketball). To maintain relative independence among the dimensions, I regarded some external causes as controllable but by others. For example, failure due to teacher bias or teacher severity is external to the pupil and uncontrollable by him or her yet is perceived by the student as subject to volitional change by the teacher. By shifting focus, a cause can be regarded as external to the actor and controllable (by others). Chance, on the other hand, is an external cause not controllable by anyone. All causes, then, are locatable within a three-dimensional taxonomic space. Considering the four major determinants of achievement outcomes shown in Figure 3, ability (which I consider here as equivalent to aptitude) is internal, stable, and uncontrollable; effort is internal, unstable, and controllable; objective task difficulty is external, stable, and controllable (by the teacher); and luck is external, unstable, and uncontrollable. These dimensions provide the meaning or connotation of a cause—aptitude, for example, is something about a person that will remain the same and cannot be volitionally altered, whereas luck or chance is something about the environment that will not remain the same yet also cannot be volitionally altered. But this is a phenomenological system; dimensional placement depends on “how it seems to me.” Causal Dimensions Causal Consequences Locus Pride, self-esteem Task Diff. Stability Expectancy (hope) Luck Others? Others? Causes Action Ability Choice Success Effort Intensity ? Persistence Failure Others? Others? FIGURE 4 Preliminary attribution-based theory of motivation with questions to be addressed. ATTRIBUTION-BASED THEORY OF MOTIVATION Thus, if success is attributed to being a “lucky person,” then luck has the same genotypic qualities as aptitude and is regarded internal and stable rather than external and unstable. In a similar manner, if effort is expended by an industrious person or withheld by a lazy person, then it is likely to be considered stable instead of unstable. And task difficulty may or may not be perceived as controllable by anyone, depending on nature of the task. The between-respondent reliability of the placement of causes on the dimensions depends on which cause and which dimension is being considered. A second important addition, which took place over an extended period and is not fundamental to the structure of the theory, was to expand the list of emotions linked with causal beliefs. Again belatedly, I became acquainted with appraisal approaches to emotion and adopted the position that feelings are directed by thoughts. It is intuitively evident that achievement strivings are not merely linked to anticipated pride. Many emotions are elicited in achievement contexts including shame and guilt, gratitude and anger, and on and on. Hence, further consideration of the association between causal thinking and feeling was needed. Among the attribution-emotion linkages that became evident over time (for empirical evidence see, e.g., Weiner, Russell, & Lerman, 1978, 1979) are the following: 1. Internal causes of success (e.g., high aptitude)—pride 2. Internal controllable causes of failure (e.g., lack of effort)—guilt and regret 3. Internal uncontrollable causes of failure (e.g., low aptitude)—shame and humiliation 4. Stable causes of failure (e.g., unfair teacher)— hopelessness 5. Unstable causes of failure (e.g., bad luck)—hope This is just a subset of the attribution-emotion connections; the majority of these affective linkages involve attributions for the behavior of others, which is not discussed in this context. However, it should be noted that emotions including anger, envy, gratitude, jealousy, Schadenfreude (joy at the failure of others), and sympathy are influenced by beliefs about causal controllability regarding the behaviors and outcomes of others (see Hareli & Weiner, 2002; Weiner, 2007). In addition, some pertinent emotions in achievement contexts, specifically happiness and unhappiness, are not linked to attributions but are tied to task outcomes—they are outcome-dependent, attribution-independent feelings. That is, they are associated with what happened rather than with why it happened. Hence, it is contended that one is happy as well as proud when succeeding because of, for example, the internal causes of high ability or high effort. In a similar manner, failure to reach a desired goal attributed to lack of aptitude is hypothesized to produce unhappiness (outcome dependent), a lowering of self-regard (locus related), and shame (a consequence of internal, uncontrollable 33 causality), along with a low expectation of future success and hopelessness and/or helplessness (stability linked). Thus, two classes of emotion, attribution-independent and attributiondependent, are differentiated on the basis of their cognitive antecedents (task outcome vs. causal attribution for the outcome), and multiple emotions are hypothesized to coexist. Other theory-pertinent facts meanwhile were accumulating from many researchers interested in attribution processes. Foremost among the contributors was Harold Kelley (1967), who formulated the well-known “Kelley cube.” His analysis identified social norms and past personal history among the key antecedents of causal beliefs because of their roles in covariation analyses. Kelley (1972) also examined causal schemata, or rules relating causes to effects, and the distinction between, for example, necessary and sufficient causality became recognized among the important determinants of causal conclusions. It also became apparent that causal understanding is not sought in all instances and is most fostered by the unexpected nonattainment of an important goal (see Gendolla & Koller, 2001). These and other additions were incorporated into the final formulation of an attribution-based theory of personal motivation, shown in Figure 5. The temporal sequence of a motivated episode can be illustrated as follows and proceeds from left to right in Figure 5. Assume a student fails an important exam. The initial experience following failure is unhappiness. Then there is a search for causality. Presume this person failed in the past even though she studies hard, whereas others succeeded on this exam. This pattern of information gives rise to the belief that the current failure is due to lack of aptitude. Aptitude is an internal, stable, uncontrollable cause, so there is a lowering of self-esteem, low expectancy of future success, hopelessness and helplessness, and shame and humiliation. Low expectancy (hopelessness) accompanied by these negative affects promotes the decision to, for example, drop out of school. Now imagine that another student fails the same exam. This person also initially experiences unhappiness. But she has been successful in the past and the night before the test she was partying rather than studying. Her current failure therefore is ascribed to insufficient effort. This internal, unstable, and controllable cause lowers personal regard but also gives rise to the maintenance of expectancy, hope, guilt, and regret, all of which are positive motivators. Hence, motivation increases and she tries harder in the future. As noted earlier, prior failure or nonreinforcement can have positive or negative future motivational consequences. This line of reasoning can be applied to affiliative contexts as well, showing the cross-domain applicability of the conception. For example, assume Bill calls Jane for a date and is rejected. This causes unhappiness and elicits attributional search; Bill asks, “Why won’t you go out with me?” Jane may be unlikely to tell some truths because she does not 34 WEINER Outcome Outcome dependent affect If positive, happy Outcome If unexpected negative, or important Causal antecedents Specific information a. Past personal history b. Social norms Etc. Causal rules Actor vs. observer perspective If negative, frustrated and sad Hedonic biases Etc. Causal dimensions Causal ascriptions Psychological consequences Behavioral consequences Cognitive and Affective Achievement Ability Effort Strategy Task Luck Etc. Locus Affiliation Physical characteristics Personality Availability of target Etc. Pride Self-esteem Stability Expectancy of success Achievement Striving Intensity Latency Persistence Etc. Hope Hopelessness Controllability Shame Guilt FIGURE 5 Final attribution-based theory of intrapersonal motivation. want to lower Bill’s self-regard by providing a cause internal to him, such as, “You are boring” (see Folkes, 1982). That is, the layperson understands locus-esteem linkages (as well as most of the other associations within the theory). But in spite of her replying, “I have to study” (an excuse or causal substitute), Bill ruminates that he has been refused many times, whereas others have girlfriends. He concludes, “I am a boring person.” This ascription has the identical genotypic or conceptual properties as failing math because of perceived low ability. Hence, esteem is lowered (because the cause is internal), there are feelings of humiliation (the cause is also perceived as uncontrollable), and low expectancy of future acceptance fostered by the absence of hope (the cause is stable). He therefore does not seek further dates. The theory is applicable across motivational domains because there is genotypic representation of causal characteristics rather than (in addition to) a phenotypic description of causes. Causal properties rather than specific causal beliefs are crucial in this conception. In addition, the theory captures what I believe is the underlying “deep structure” of a motivational episode: thinking gives rise to feelings which guide action. Unlike prior expectancy/value theories, the feelings are not anticipated, such as future pride, but are experienced (e.g., guilt and shame) and act as goads to action. This reduces the teleological characterization of expectancy/value theory. EMPIRICAL VALIDATION AND EVALUATIVE CONCLUSION Does this conceptual system receive empirical support? There is little doubt that positive and negative outcomes, respectively, give rise to general positive and negative emotions; that undesired and/or unexpected events promote causal search; that the cause selected is dependent on a variety of antecedents including social norms, past history, schematic beliefs and hedonic biases; and that locus, stability, and control are key causal properties (although there may be other causal characteristics such as globality, or causal generality across situations). Causal locus relates to pride and self-esteem; causal stability in part determines expectancy shifts and the extent of hope, hopelessness, and helplessness; and causal control is linked with affects including shame (to uncontrollable causality), and guilt and regret (to controllable causality). Indeed, attributions account for a surprising extent of emotional life. There are voluminous literatures supporting these assertions (see Weiner, 1985, 1986, 1995). Most encouraging concerning the applicability of the theory is that changes in causal beliefs alter achievement-related performance, although this conclusion is in great need of further empirical confirmation and elaboration. For example, Perry and his colleagues (e.g., Perry, Hechter, Menec, & Weinberg, 1993) frequently have documented that interventions altering the attributions of failing students from low ATTRIBUTION-BASED THEORY OF MOTIVATION ability to lack of effort improve college performance. Other attempts in school settings to alter causal beliefs so that failure is regarded as unstable rather than stable also produce improvement in school-related outcomes (see Wilson, Damiani, & Shelton, 2002). And convincing the elderly that their failure to exercise is not attributable to “old age” (which, just as low aptitude, is regarded an internal, stable, and uncontrollable cause) but rather is due to a lack of effort augments walking behavior (see Sarkisian, Prohaska, Davis, & Weiner, 2007). In sum, attribution intervention or reattribution training has resulted in behavioral change. This is in part because the interventions address the facts that self-doubt (attributions of failure to the self and success to external factors) and stable beliefs about the causes of failure are important impediments to motivation, whereas unstable ascriptions for failure result in hope, which facilitates motivation. In addition, regarding the conceptual contribution of this approach, among the current conceptions of achievement motivation, attribution theory may be alone in embracing a goal of the grand theories, seeking to explain actions in domains other than achievement, while at the same time having a structure that includes interrelated parts ordered in a temporal sequence. In spite of this array of evidence and generality, I would be remiss, perhaps even intellectually dishonest, if I did not share a misgiving. I am very concerned about the last links in the theory specifying the effects of expectancy and affect on performance. With regard to expectancy, contradictory views have been expressed by motivation theorists. It may be that low expectancy of success or a difficult task generates most effort (see Locke & Latham, 1990); or, as Atkinson (1957) intuited, intermediate difficulty tasks are most motivating; or, as Lewin (1938) and Rotter (1954) argued, that being close to a goal generates most motivation. I suspect that expectancy has a great impact on motivation but in a varied manner. For example, low expectancy (a difficult task) may most increase performance intensity (effort), intermediate difficulty tasks may be most preferred and selected when external incentives are not involved, and high-expectancy tasks are most attractive in situations where external rewards are at stake and may generate greatest persistence in the face of failure. In short, the relation between expectancy and motivation seems to vary with the dependent variable that is being considered. For this reason, and because within attribution theory incentive value has been replaced by current affective experience, I am wavering about the viability of expectancy/value theory as the umbrella for this approach. A FINAL NOTE It has been said that neither Freud nor Skinner could explain their behaviors with their own theories. Perhaps most 35 encouraging and satisfying is that attribution theory predicts my main reactions to receiving the Thorndike Award: happiness (outcome dependent), pride (due to very long-term effort), and gratitude (to my students and colleagues and to the many giants whose shoulders were available to stand on and lean against). ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This article was based on the address given for the E. L. Thorndike Research Award for Career Achievement, presented to the author at the American Psychological Association Convention in Toronto, Canada, in August 2009. REFERENCES Atkinson, J. W. (1957). Motivational determinants of risk-taking behavior. 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Jones, D. E. Kanouse, H. H. Kelley, R. E. Nisbett, S. Valins, & B. Weiner (Eds.), Attribution: Perceiving the causes of behavior (pp. 151–174). Morristown, NJ: General Learning Press. Lewin, K. (1938). The conceptual representation and the measurement of psychological forces. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Locke, E., & Latham, G. (1990). A theory of goal setting and task performance. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Perry, R. P., Hechter, F. J., Menec, V. H., & Weinberg, L. E. (1993). Enhancing achievement motivation and performance in college students: An attributional retraining perspective. Research in Higher Education, 34, 687–723. Rotter, J. B. (1954). Social learning and clinical psychology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Rotter, J. B. (1966). Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement. Psychological Monographs, 80, 1– 28. Sarkisian, C. A., Prohaska, T. R., Davis, C., & Weiner, B. (2007). Pilot test of an attributional retraining intervention top raise walking levels in sedentary older adults. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 55, 1842–1846. Spence, K. W. (1956). Behavior theory and conditioning. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Thorndike, E. L. (1911). Animal intelligence. New York: Macmillan. 36 WEINER Tolman, E. C. (1932). Purposive behavior in animals and men. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. Weiner, B. (1985). An attribution theory of achievement motivation and emotion. Psychological Review, 92, 548–573. Weiner, B. (1986). An attributional theory of motivation and emotion. New York: Springer-Verlag. Weiner, B. (1992). Human motivation: Metaphors, theory, and research. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Weiner, B. (1995). Judgments of responsibility: A foundation for a theory of social conduct. New York: Guilford. Weiner, B. (2006). Social motivation, justice, and the moral emotions. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Weiner, B. (2007). Examining emotional diversity in the classroom: An attribution theorist considers the moral emotions. In P. A. Schutz & R. Pekrun (Eds.), Emotion in education (pp. 75–88). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. Weiner, B., Frieze, I. H., Kukla, A., Reed, L., Rest, S., & Rosenbaum, R. M. (1971). Perceiving the causes of success and failure. Morristown, NJ: General Learning Press. Weiner, B., Nierenberg, R., & Goldstein, M. (1976). Social learning (locus of control) versus attributional (causal stability) interpretations of expectancy of success. Journal of Personality, 44, 52– 68. Weiner, B., & Potepan, P. A. (1970). Personality correlates and affective reactions toward exams of succeeding and failing college students. Journal of Educational Psychology, 61, 144–151. Weiner, B., Russell, D., & Lerman, D. (1978). Affective consequences of causal ascriptions. In J. H. Harvey, W. J. Ickes, & R. F. Kidd (Eds.), New directions in attribution research (Vol. 2, pp. 59–88). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Weiner, B., Russell, D., & Lerman, D. (1979). The cognition-emotion process in achievement-related contexts. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 37, 1211–1220. Wilson, T. D., Damiani, M., & Shelton, N. (2002). Improving the academic performance of college students with brief attributional interventions. In J. Aronson (Ed.), Improving academic achievement: Impact of psychological factors on education (pp. 89–108). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. Copyright of Educational Psychologist is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. JOURNAL OF APPLIED SPORT PSYCHOLOGY, 31: 134–146, 2019 Copyright # Association for Applied Sport Psychology ISSN: 1041-3200 print / 1533-1571 online DOI: 10.1080/10413200.2018.1539885 EPILOGUE A Commentary and Reflections on the Field of Organizational Sport Psychology CHRISTOPHER R. D. WAGSTAFF University of Portsmouth In this epilogue to the special issue of Journal of Applied Sport Psychology on organizational sport psychology, I provide a brief commentary on each of the articles contained within the issue and offer some reflections on the field. In drawing together my reflections on the current state of the field of organizational sport psychology, I offer three pressing observations relating to the need for intervention work, the need for greater duty of care, and the need for practitioner action. It has been a decade since David Fletcher and I concluded our review of the then nascent research on organizational psychology in elite sport by stating, Those governing and managing elite sport have a duty of care to protect and support the mental wellbeing of its employees and members. In addition to these statutory requirements, National Sport Organizations also have an ethical obligation to create performance environments which facilitate individual and group flourishing. … It appears that the “global sporting arms race” has had both positive and negative consequences for those operating in elite sport. A convergence of evidence points to the organisational environment as having the potential to significantly impact on individuals’ wellbeing and performance. It also indicates that the climate and culture in elite sport requires careful and informed management in order to optimise individuals’ experiences and organisational flourishing. However, the body of knowledge is still in its early stages and restricted. (Fletcher & Wagstaff, 2009, pp. 432–433) In the intervening years since these sentiments were expressed, there have been considerable developments. Indeed, the knowledge in this domain has matured markedly from its early foundations in organizational stress to incorporate the study of a diverse range of phenomena from a variety of epistemological, ontological, and methodological perspectives (cf. Wagstaff, 2017). But what impact has this work had? Despite the research developments, a cursory glance at global sport media over just the past 2 years will provide a newsreel of bad press for sport organizations and a “rogue’s gallery” of those leading Received 20 October 2018; accepted 20 October 2018 Address correspondence to Christopher R. D. Wagstaff, Sport and Exercise Science, University of Portsmouth, Spinakker Building, Cambridge Road, Portsmouth P012ER, United Kingdom of chris.wagstaff@port.ac.uk Great Britain and Northern Ireland. E-mail: EPILOGUE 135 them. To draw on just a few of the more high profile, there has been the fallout of the Larry Nassar sexual abuse of female gymnasts; numerous allegations of bullying, racial, gender, and sexual abuse in Olympic sport; the state-sponsored doping program in Russia; the ball-tampering fiasco in Australian cricket; and many reports of sport organizations having a “toxic culture.” In reflecting 10 years hence on the conclusions of Fletcher and Wagstaff (2009), these scenarios collectively point to a failure of sport organizations in their (a) duty of care to protect and support the mental well-being of its employees and members, and (b) ethical obligation to create performance environments that facilitate individual and group flourishing. Moreover, there has been plenty of anecdotal evidence of the organizational environment as having the potential to significantly impact on individuals’ well-being and performance and that the climate and culture in elite sport requires careful and informed management to optimize individuals’ experiences and organizational flourishing. But in returning to the final observation from the quotation from Fletcher and Wagstaff, is the body of knowledge . . . still in its early stages and restricted? I would argue that it is not. Much has been done to extend knowledge on the demands that athletes, coaches, and support staff face in their day-to-day work in elite sport environments. We have even seen work emerge that has examined and attempted to improve organizational functioning in such environments. Yet clearly not enough of this work has been translated into changes at the coalface in elite sport. This might be because of the nature of elite sport organizations, which are complex, turbulent, and volatile social systems (see Wagstaff, 2017) in which individuals have an often chaotic and precarious existence (Gilmore, Wagstaff, & Smith, 2018). The failure to prevent organizational dereliction of duty of care may also reflect poor regulation of organizations and their leaders who ruthlessly pursue “winning at all costs.” The failure might be a consequence of either low-impact or poorly translated research being conducted in the domain of organizational sport psychology over the past decade. Alternatively, the issue might be due to a void of competence and service support expertise to facilitate flourishing sport environments that enable thriving, and the development of organizational resilience in sport. My suspicion is that the answer lies, in part, with all these explanations; the cause is systematic, cultural, and a reflection of the state of research and practice. The success and survival of sport organizations is predicated on performance outcomes. Often, this performance is prioritized over duty of care, culture, tradition, legacy planning, ethics, and welfare. It is abundantly clear that sport organizations must better protect their charges and undertake regular systematic monitoring of cultural and climatic environments within sport. Yet researchers must do more to translate their knowledge, undertaking more ambitious intervention research, using cohort and longitudinal research designs, process evaluation, the sampling of multiple social groups (e.g., athletes, coaches, support staff) concurrently, and developing more effective knowledge transfer partnerships with sport organizations. Finally, practitioners must develop competencies in organizational service delivery and move out of their comfort zone. I continue to believe, as I did in 2009, that our profession will flounder if we remain pigeonholed as mental skills coaches, regardless of the positive move to better incorporate counseling skills within our service repertoire (Sly, Mellalieu, & Wagstaff, in press). We have so much more to offer, but to fulfill this potential we must diversify and enhance competencies to work with new people, in new ways, within sport organizations. I recommend that sport psychologists to break free of the shackles of the science and medicine team, and after developing the requisite expertise, offer their services across the organizational hierarchy. For instance, the development of—to name a few—leadership and coaching behavior expertise, value-driven norm identification and promotion, wise emotion regulation 136 C. R. D. WAGSTAFF strategy selection, prosocial deviance and citizenship behavior, stress management and self-care, socialization processes refinement and provision, and cultural and climatic awareness and monitoring, are all areas of service provision sport psychologists might develop and, important to note, offer to all individuals in the organization. If sustained success and well-being are dependent on the functioning of a complex network of relationships, utilization of expertise, and optimization of cultural and climatic factors, and not individual or collective talent, we must look beyond interventions with athletes. We must dispel the myth of individualism (see Wagstaff, 2017). The articles published in this special issue all significantly extend the knowledge within their respective lines of inquiry. Taken together, they offer a key reference point for future research and application knowledge. In the next section, I provide a brief commentary on each article and some reflections on the field. Given the growing scientization and medicalization of elite sport environments and the recent observation of the largely deleterious impact of managerial turnover-related organizational change on support staff (see Wagstaff, Gilmore, & Thelwell, 2015, 2016), it is surprising that more studies have not been dedicated to the working experiences of science and medicine support and management staff. Arnold et al.’s (this issue) examination of the “team behind the team’s” stressors therefore offers a valuable contribution to knowledge regarding the experiences and needs of this social group. Surely it is time to educate undergraduate students and neophyte practitioners of the realities of the profession they seek to join? Why do professional societies and regulatory bodies (PSRBs) in sport science and medicine not systematically provide education and support regarding professional burnout and turnover, lifestyle advice, professional development, and precarious employment and unemployment advice? Thankfully, work is emerging to support sport science and medicine educators and trainers in this endeavor. For instance, Hings and colleagues recently observed professional development challenges for practitioners (Hings, Wagstaff, Anderson, Gilmore, & Thelwell, 2018a,b) and examined the emotional education–training–practice gap in the professional formation of sport psychologists, and they provided guidance for individuals at each career stage (Hings, Wagstaff, Anderson, Gilmore, & Thelwell, in press). In Arnold et al.’s study, I particularly liked the reporting of example outcomes within the results, which also extended previous qualitative organizational stressor studies and better reflect the transactional conceptual foundation of this work. The very large sample in Arnold et al.’s study, including both science and medicine and performance management staff from a diverse range of sports, was also a real strength of their study. That so many of these participants reported relationship and interpersonal issues with colleagues and coaches highlights the importance of sport psychologists working with these social groups. I felt other notable stressor themes for reflection in this sample were contractual issues, organizational processes, organizational culture, and travel and accommodation. Although the last of these is common among other social groups in sport organizations (e.g., athletes, coaches), the others are reported less frequently and indicate that “supporting support staff,” as well as management staff, might require some differentiation from the support of athletes. Regardless of the nuanced stressors for each social group in sport organizations, I believe that cultural and climatic interventions are likely to be of benefit to all social groups. Arnold et al.’s data contribute to the growing evidence that working as a member of support staff in elite sport is precarious (see Gilmore et al., 2018). Indeed, these individuals are typically poorly remunerated in comparison to managerial or playing staff, work undesirable hours, spending substantial time away from home, and are often at the mercy EPILOGUE 137 of questionable employment practices (see Waddington, Roderick, & Naik, 2001; Wagstaff et al., 2015). In view of such precarity and demands, sport organizations often rely on the appeal of working in elite sport to recruit and retain support staff. I have also noted—with very different implications—that both sport organizations and support staff are typically acutely aware that there is exists a conveyor belt of qualified professionals eager to work in elite sport environments. Consequently, whereas Arnold et al.’s study provides further valuable evidence of the importance of supporting “the team behind the team,” these professionals currently have limited job security and formal professional support. Such factors do little to support an individual’s professional quality of work life, and employers and PSRBs must do more to prepare and support these individuals. Arnold et al.’s study points to sport psychologists as being one conduit for such support and education, yet to do so, sport psychologists must reconsider their service provision and clientele. Clearly, support and management staff would benefit from organizational stressor support from sport psychologists, but I would question the extent to which they are prepared or able to provide this support in their traditional roles within support teams, where they are typically charged with providing mental skills training and mental health first aid. Arnold et al. provide some recommendations for sport psychologists to better assist medicine and science and management staff in elite sport with the job insecurity demands they encounter (e.g., proactive coping strategies, enhancing perceptions of control and self-efficacy, reducing role conflict, and strengthening organizational communication). Tamminen, Sabiston, and Crocker (this issue) commendably integrated theoretical perspectives of support, appraisals, and performance satisfaction in their study. In doing so, they go some way to answering repeated calls for the examination of the stress process components together, rather than in isolation (see Arnold, Wagstaff, Steadman, & Pratt, 2017). I also really enjoyed the inclusion of appraisal as a variable in this study. Appraisal is a notoriously difficult variable to capture meaningfully, and sport stress researchers have been able to bypass this given the opportunities for mining other aspects of the stress process (e.g., stressors). That appraisal research has such a low presence in sport stress research both saddens and disappoints me given the pivotal role of appraisal in the transactional theory. Tamminen and colleagues also have noteworthy elements of novelty in their study regarding the use of organizational stressors as “background variable.” That is, the results of this study advance organizational stress theory by modeling stressors as something other than an independent variable. Moreover, by testing organizational stressors as a moderator variable, Tamminen et al.’s work speaks nicely to one of the central tenets of the transactional theory regarding the ongoing, iterative, process nature of stress. The authors’ inclusion of performance satisfaction as an outcome variable was also commendable, given that performance outcomes have generally been elided within the extant organizational stressor research. It was interesting that Tamminen et al.’s data did not support an indirect effect of esteem support on athletes’ perceptions of performance via secondary appraisal when organizational stressors were included as a moderator. Yet, such findings do support the “background” role of organizational stressors, and I would be excited to see future examination of other performance indicators. Nevertheless, in a warning to the reader, due to their greater frequency than competitive and personal stressors (cf. Hanton, Fletcher, & Coughlan, 2005), we should not confuse the conceptually sound positioning of organizational stressors as “background variables” with a secondary status regarding their relational meaning for individuals. Although some organizational stressors might appear to tick along in the background, athletes typically appraise these demands as threatening or harmful with few resources to resolve or address them (e.g., Hanton, Wagstaff, & Fletcher, 2012). 138 C. R. D. WAGSTAFF Given the complexity of the stress process, with the many possible mediator and moderator variables, one might expect only a weak-to-moderate direct effect of organizational stressor frequency on performance outcomes. Therefore, although the use of performance satisfaction offered a useful proxy for the cross-sectional data in Tamminen et al.’s study, it would be interesting to examine a similar model using objective performance over time. That is, researchers should examine the stressor–performance (–well-being) relationship using longitudinal designs to build on this positive step forward in including performance satisfaction. Another finding of interest and for further exploration relates to Tamminen et al.’s observation that more frequent team and culture stressors strengthened the relationship between athletes’ perceived support and their appraisals of resources to cope with competitive demands. Consequently, researchers might consider examining the relationships between team and culture stressors and other team-level variables and processes (e.g., cliques, conflict resolution, cohesion, collaboration, decision making). Within organizational sport psychology, the area of stress and well-being has received more research attention than any other dimension and researchers have been slow to diversify. Yet, as the domain of organizational stress has matured, there has been substantial conceptual and methodological refinement, with taxonomic stressor identification and wider demographic examination (e.g., Arnold et al., this issue; see also, Arnold, Fletcher, & Daniels, 2016) leading to measurement development, and more diverse methodological designs and advanced modelling of moderator and mediator variables (e.g., Tamminen et al., this issue; see also Larner, Wagstaff, Thelwell, & Corbett, 2017). In a report to the UK Health and Safety Executive, Cox (1993) argued that the priority in workplace stress research can no longer be more studies on risk groups and risk factors: rather, researchers should address the design, implementation, and evaluation of interventions. I am unsure that we have reached that same stage of saturation that Cox noted regarding the risk groups and risk factors in sport organizations, but we certainly need to dedicate research attention to interventions. Indeed, I believe the most pressing issue in organizational stress and well-being research in sport is the dearth of knowledge on what effective and efficacious organizational interventions “look like.” Although this need might move researchers to instinctively focus on “what works” in stress intervention research, the why and how of these interventions also requires attention. Too little intervention work is published in the sport psychology domain as a whole, and too little of that work provides tacit information for applied practitioners or academics. Hence, and as clearly communicated Randall, Nielsen, and Houdmont (this issue), a focus on intervention outcomes alone elides much valuable information and arguably limits the opportunity for transferability of a given intervention. Hence, to optimize intervention effects, promote knowledge transference, and learning for adaptation to other contexts, there is a need to know how organizational interventions work (i.e., what are the working mechanisms of a particular intervention) as well as why it worked (i.e., what were the drivers of change; cf. Nielsen, Taris, & Cox, 2010). In light of these observations, I was very encouraged to receive two submissions relating to the use of process evaluation for stress interventions. Given the similarity of these submissions, only one was accepted for publication in the special issue, an outcome that gave me cause for empathy with the author whose work did not make it into this issue. Randall, Nielsen, and Houdmont’s article contains several key messages for stress and well-being researchers, as well as those seeking to provide organizational-level interventions in general. Indeed, I see no reason why the important messages from Randall et al.’s article could not be relevant for those providing non-stress-related organizational intervention in sport. Among the messages that resonated with me from Randall et al.’s article were the challenges of intervention delivery in organizational settings and the influence of EPILOGUE 139 these practicalities for the completion of primary stress management interventions (i.e., those that target the reduction of stressors in the environment) and use of randomized control trials involving large numbers of participants. In addition, readers should heed Randall et al.’s advice not to assume that all participants are equally likely to experience an average intervention effect. As such, those undertaking organizational interventions might compare outcomes for those indicating that they felt equipped and motivated to get the best out of the intervention and whether those who reported experiencing challenges prior to the intervention report the greatest improvements after its delivery. Randall et al. also provide valuable resources in the form of example interview questions and questionnaire items that might be used as part of a primary stress intervention process evaluation and will undoubtedly help researchers to identify implementation failures (problems with intervention design and delivery) and contextual events that influence intervention outcomes. To offer a word on the state of stress-based interventions in sport organizations. Randall et al. observe that the majority of extant intervention research reflects secondary stress management interventions, focused on the development of psychological resources (see Didymus & Fletcher, 2017; Rumbold, Fletcher, & Daniels, 2012). As research indicates that organizational stressors are prevalent and pervasive (Arnold, Wagstaff, Steadman, & Pratt, 2017), and commonly appraised as threatening or harmful and largely uncontrollable (see Hanton et al., 2012), it might be that some organizational stressors in sport are not readily amenable to primary intervention; that some organizational stressors might be unavoidable (cf. Fletcher, Hanton, & Mellalieu, 2006). Nevertheless, researchers must be bolder in developing primary interventions that reduce the frequency, duration, and intensity of amenable organizational stressors through cultural and climatic change. Given the complexity of organizational culture change in sport (see Wagstaff & BurtonWylie, 2018), sport psychologists might reflect on the opportunities to provide “nudge” organizational interventions (see Thaler & Sunstein, 2008). Such interventions should be considered part of a sport organization’s duty of care to those operating within its sphere of influence and reflect the needs of managers, coaches, support staff, and athletes. We move from Randall et al.’s call for the use of process evaluation to Slater and Barker’s development of an efficacy evaluation of a longitudinal leadership intervention to develop social identity. Slater and Barker’s combination of longitudinal intervention work, timely application of social identity leadership, and sampling of an understudied and undersupported sample of disabled athletes offers several novel and valuable contributions to the field. I have observed with interest the fast emergence of social identity and social identity leadership research in sport over recent years. By intertwining strands of social support, group dynamics, organizational psychology, and leadership theory, this line of research has much to contribute to organizational sport psychology. Moreover, it is encouraging that there are several prominent research groups around the world working in this space, which I am sure will accelerate conceptual and applied knowledge development; indeed, given the speed at which research on social identity in sport has blossomed, I expect this work to continue to be a growth area in the coming years. Slater and Barker’s operationalization of social identity leadership development translated the phases of Haslam, Eggins, and Reynolds’s (2003) actualizing social and personal identity resources (ASPIRe) model into three workshops. The rationale for this approach was based on promising findings from nonsport organizational psychology research examining the use of the ASPIRe model with hospital staff (O’Brien et al., 2004) and teachers (Reynolds, Subasic, Lee, & Tindall, 2014). Although the use of models developed outside of sport have much potential value for knowledge transference into organizational sport psychology, practitioners might be best served by context-sensitive conceptualization, 140 C. R. D. WAGSTAFF instrumentation, and application. Researchers seeking to build on Slater and Barker’s promising work might seek to provide intervention content directly to participants, collect social validation from all end users of intervention content, and include within intervention work additional social groups within the sport organization. In doing so, researchers might obtain evidence of the efficacy of the ASPIRe-based intervention work not just from leaders but also from other members of their organization. This more inclusive approach is particularly important given the main delineation of social identity leadership from other leadership theories (e.g., transformational leadership) being the inclusion of the cognitions and actions of both leaders and followers, and not only those of the leader in isolation. In their systematic review of performance management literature across elite sport and other performance domains (e.g., business, performing arts, military, medical, and emergency services), Molan, Kelly, Arnold, and Matthews provide a landmark reference for scholars examining this concept. Moreover, their observation of the similarities and differences between elite sport and other performance domains have several important implications. First, the different strategic and individual-level performance management processes and commonalities in operational level stimulated me to reflect on why these commonalities are present and whether better knowledge transference between these performance domains would benefit. Clearly, the authors highlight signaling theory as potentially useful for understanding how sport performance directors’ vision can be translated into meaningful practices and communicated to promote positive staff and organizational outcomes. Indeed, I can see how observable strategic actions within elite sport (e.g., explicit communication of values and organizational objectives, development of strategic plans, publication of aligned policies) are likely to be interpreted as signals that, in turn, might influence the perceptions and behaviors of stakeholders (e.g., staff, clubs, funding agencies). Molan et al. interpreted the extant literature to indicate that the professional development of coaches, support staff, and management in elite sport organizations is predominantly informal or on-the-job learning. Such findings mirror organizational stressor themes reported by Arnold et al. in their “team behind the team” article, also in this issue. Taken together, both studies provide a strong message that professional development and support for those in coaching, management, and support staff roles needs greater attention within sport. I would agree with Molan et al. that there are potential benefits of a multilevel approach to performance management by considering the components of performance management at individual, operational, and strategic levels and their interaction with contextual variables (e.g., leadership, organizational culture). I look forward to more performance management work in elite sport, and I believe much of this will continue to offer valuable “crossover” knowledge for nonsport organizations. For instance, other performance domains might be interested to understand elite sport approaches at the individual level, the management of star performers and global celebrities, or those who have high value and lengthy non-performance-based contracts; at the strategic level, the use of negotiation, authenticity, and dark triad behaviors; and at the operational level, the use of regular performance debriefs, feedback, and planning. From performance management, we turn to Gledhill and Harwood’s research note on female football talent development environments in the United Kingdom. It was pleasing to note that Gledhill and Harwood’s findings provided indirect support for organizational stressor taxonomies. That is, the most positive perceptions that players reported were of long-term development focus and support networks, but the least positive perceptions were of communication and understanding the athlete. It follows that athletes’ (and other social agents’) perceptions of their environment will likely be a source of strain or support. Thus, this work offers another important illustration of the central role of one’s environment for EPILOGUE 141 long-term athlete development while highlighting those factors rated with the most and least positive perceptions for female footballers. Gledhill and Harwood’s study provides support for the opportunities allied with talent development environment study and design from a holistic ecological approach (cf. Larsen, Alfermann, Henriksen, & Christensen, 2013). Such approaches reject the traditional focus on individual athletes (i.e., a myth of individualism) and shift the focus from talent detection to talent development, with specific attention devoted to the environments in which expertise develops. A central component of the holistic ecological approach is the role and function of organizational culture (see Henriksen, 2015), on which research and applied attention has recently grown (see Wagstaff & Burton-Wylie, 2018). Nevertheless, some notable exceptions aside (see Henriksen, 2015), I remain surprised by the predominance of cross-sectional research on talent development environments, and I would encourage researchers within this domain to undertake cohort studies, or where this is epistemologically incompatible, longitudinal case studies and ethnographic work. Moreover, researchers must undertake more talent development environment intervention work that retains the central role of organizational culture while being cognizant of broader organizational sport psychology trends relevant to environments (e.g., organizational change and climate). The focus of Martin and Eys’s case study on selection for an elite performance team offers a novel opportunity for knowledge sharing for those interested in organizational sport psychology. Although direct transference of the case study to sport selection should be cautioned, the common goal of getting the right people into one’s organization—in the right roles—is pivotal for any high-performance organization. As Martin and Eys note in their article, member selection is an opportunity to acquire human capital, whereby organizations seek candidates with characteristics that best suit their needs (e.g., knowledge, skills, abilities). Nevertheless, selection process clarity, timing, and length are consistently observed in athlete organizational stressor taxonomies and regularly provide the fuel for explosive social media and punditry debate. In my applied practice I have witnessed elite sport organizations rely too heavily on a myth of individualism (see Wagstaff, 2017) by prioritizing athletic prowess (but not performance per se), status, brand, and market value over work ethic, leadership, and organizational citizenship. Recruitment, selection, and socialization processes in elite sport are never objective and are often problematic and contentious. All too often these processes are secretive, poorly communicated, and elide valuable psychosocial information. Moreover, to protect power, ego, and their job, leaders rarely publicly admit mistakes or errors in their processes, and there is clearly much scope to improve such processes. As such, Martin and Eys’s case study provides a timely and novel insight into the selection process in a highly specialized military performance team. Of particular interest to me was the importance of an individual’s “fit” within the performance team, and the power of peers to veto prospective recruits when collective agreement on that individual’s nonselection was achieved. Whether elements of this approach to recruitment could translate to sport remain to be seen. Other findings that I found particularly resonant from the military squadron were the selection process transparency, collegiality to prospective recruits and early integration and socialization, mentoring for new recruits, and the thread of cultural importance throughout the selection and socialization processes. Taking the last of these, one key opportunity for sport organization learning was the stylization of selection and socialization processes to retain cultural traditions, engage symbolism, and promote sensemaking. That is, the “Snowbirds” used the selection process to (a) facilitate the identification of ideal members; (b) provide those potential candidates with a clear understanding of the normative expectations and culture; and (c) immediately begin candidate integration, all with a specific orientation toward their 142 C. R. D. WAGSTAFF organization. Many sport organizations would benefit by incorporating similar values into their recruitment. This incorporation might facilitate alignment of intentions and expectations between the various subgroups within an organization (e.g., administrators, coaches, and athletes; cf. Martin, Eys, & Spink, 2017), and enable greater transparency and collaboration in the recruitment, selection, and socialization of future team members. Nevertheless, such involvement should not place additional demands on senior athletes and should not infringe on their substantive role as an athlete. In taking these findings and reflecting on the broader organizational sport psychology literature that has referred to selection (e.g., Hodge, Henry, & Smith, 2014; Martin, Evans, & Spink, 2016), I would argue that sport organizations must (a) recruit athletes who fit within their organizational culture and will positively contribute to the team climate; (b) be transparent during recruitment and establish congruency with incoming member role expectations; (c) undertake and adequately communicate to all parties unambiguous and timely selection decisions; (d) provide deselected individuals with authentic, achievable, and constructive feedback; and (e) revisit performance feedback through individual performance management discussions or promote closure via exit interviews on departure from a program. In drawing together my reflections on this special issue and the field of organizational sport psychology, I offer three pressing observations of the field relating to the need for intervention work, greater duty of care, and practitioner action. THE NEED FOR INTERVENTION WORK Researchers are urged to undertake intervention research within organizational sport psychology. This is pivotal to fully communicate the role of psychosocial and environmental factors in the promotion of individual, team, and organizational performance and wellbeing. There remains a dearth of intervention research in organizational sport psychology. This scarcity is perhaps an artifact of the domain’s relative youthful status in comparison to more established lines of inquiry within sport psychology; yet, now that the conceptual foundations have been lain, researchers must construct impactful intervention knowledge across all silos of organizational sport psychology. When conducting intervention studies, researchers should evaluate not only what works but how and why. Process evaluation offers a framework for such evaluations and can offer a valuable foil for measures of intervention effectiveness. In addition, much of the work on organizational sport psychology is published on the assumption that organizational environments can be easily controlled and suitable control groups easily found for intervention comparison. Yet, given the volatile and precarious nature of elite sport, organizational change and personnel turnover are common (see Wagstaff et al., 2015). In addition, in Olympic sport, countries often share centralized resources, such as facilities and employees, thus blurring organizational boundaries and isolating intervention effects problematic. Moreover, it is difficult to find, and for some researchers epistemologically counterintuitive to seek, organizational controls for interventions. Therefore, given these challenges, researchers might find it more appropriate to use comparison or reference groups rather than control groups for organizational interventions in sport. THE NEED FOR GREATER DUTY OF CARE Sport organizations, professional societies and regulatory bodies, and education and training providers are currently failing in their duty of care to individuals in sport. Sport EPILOGUE 143 organizations must be both supported and expected to engage in appropriate and fair employment practices and to monitor and manage the cultural and climatic health of their environments. Until only recently there has remained a tendency to overlook the climatic and cultural factors associated with the optimal development of athletes (for a recent review of organizational culture, see Wagstaff & Burton-Wylie, 2018). Yet sport organizations must also be guided to likely relationships between organizational culture and climate and burnout, turnover, identity, commitment, engagement, well-being, and performance. To optimize this guidance, both researchers and practitioners must do more; yet, the body of work presented in this special issue will provide a key resource. It is unfortunate that, despite repeated observations, mental skills training to enhance athletes’ performance is unlikely to be sufficient in addressing the expanding needs of those operating in contemporary elite sport (see Fletcher & Wagstaff, 2009), the education and training of sport psychologists continues to be dominated by the psychological skills. As the guardians of practitioner qualification pathways and legal registration for practitioners, PSRBs must promote the importance of organizational sport psychology within service provision guidelines, competency frameworks, and standards of proficiency. There are some examples where organizational factors are represented within curricula guidelines and qualifications (e.g., British Psychological Society, British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Association for Applied Sport Psychology), but organizational service delivery competence is not yet a core component of sport psychology training and qualification. These needs must also be communicated to education and training providers, where they exist outside of professional bodies (e.g., universities). The current preparation of sport science and medicine practitioners for the professional realities of elite sport is woefully inadequate. Indeed, neophyte practitioner reflections highlight inadequate preparation for the requirements of elite sport environments. For example, Larsen (2017) recently reflected that the practical challenges associated with attempting to integrate oneself successfully into an elite sport organization was like “bringing a knife to a gunfight” (p. 7). Both sport organizations and PSRBs must work together to support and protect those they have a duty of care toward, and sport psychologists are both a focus for this need and a key social agent for change. THE NEED FOR PRACTITIONER ACTION I finish with some thoughts on practitioners as agents for change toward better integration of organizational service provision. Recently, Sly et al. (in press) reflected on the professional development and ever-expanding roles and responsibilities of the applied sport psychology practitioner. Sly et al. observed that sport psychologists are increasingly regarded as not only a facilitator of performance enhancement and custodian of performer well-being but also an architect of cultural excellence. With growing requests for practitioners to advise on elite sport climates (Fletcher & Wagstaff, 2009), as well as other diverse performance domains (e.g., military, performing arts, high-risk occupations; Portenga, Aoyagi, & Cohen, 2017), the creation and sustainment of a high-performance culture has now come to be regarded as a key function of sport psychology practice (Henriksen, 2015). As such, I urge sport psychology practitioners to prioritize the development of cultural and sociopolitical skills and knowledge of organizational psychology practices. The scope of these practices requires practitioners to adopt a more flexible and free-ranging role, whereby microlevel psychological skills and counseling provision might be complemented by engagement in macrolevel performance and organizational and management practices (Cruickshank & Collins, 2015). This macrolevel service provision also 144 C. R. D. WAGSTAFF necessitates active engagement in a multitude of working alliances with various social agent groups (e.g., performance directors, coaches, administrators, and support staff), who operate across various levels of the organization (McDougall, Nesti, & Richardson, 2015). Eubank, Nesti, and Cruickshank (2014) suggested that satisfactory fulfillment of this wider social provision requires the adoption of roles similar to those of human resources managers and occupational psychologists, in an effort to improve communication, reduce conflict, and promote a culturally congruent view of performance excellence. Consequently, practitioners might also seek to quickly establish a cultural appreciation of the complex social hierarchies, micropolitical structures, and cultural dynamics that exist within various levels of elite sport environments (cf. McCalla & Fitzpatrick, 2016; McDougall et al., 2015; Mellalieu, 2016; Nesti, 2016). Nevertheless, when operating within such environments, practitioners must remain cognizant of the barriers they may face when attempting to integrate themselves within an organization. For example, Nesti (2016) recalled the “often-experienced skepticism” surrounding psychology within sport. Elsewhere, Gardner (2016) noted the possibility of organizational resistance, should the sport psychologist fail to effectively establish their roles and responsibilities within an organization. As such, practitioners must do due diligence in the development of organizational service delivery skills and when attempting to gain trust and develop credibility, they must acknowledge, assimilate, and ultimately seek to influence the dynamic organizational cultures that exist in sport (Mellalieu, 2017; Nesti, 2016). Indeed, issues relating to congruence and assimilation with established cultural norms and expectations present a key consideration for sport psychologists offering organizational service delivery. Drawing on previous empirical perspectives, Schinke and Hackfort (2016) recommended that practitioners align themselves with the culture they are trying to influence or risk extinction. Yet, in an environment often dictated by a ruthless pursuit of excellence (cf. McDougall et al., 2015), such alignment can prove professionally and ethically problematic. Consequently, practitioners must at times resist cultural assimilation, despite the risk of team alienation and possible employment termination (Gilmore et al., 2018; McDougall et al., 2015). In sum, although practitioners should be part of the culture, they must also be apart from it, ensuring that one’s support remains congruent with one’s personal beliefs, values, and wider professional philosophy. 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Copyright of Journal of Applied Sport Psychology is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. JOURNAL OF APPLIED SPORT PSYCHOLOGY, 23: 360–376, 2011 C Association for Applied Sport Psychology Copyright ISSN: 1041-3200 print / 1533-1571 online DOI: 10.1080/10413200.2011.583619 Sport Psychology Consulting Effectiveness: The Sport Psychology Consultant’s Perspective LEE-ANN SHARP University College Plymouth St. Mark and St. John KEN HODGE University of Otago The aim of this study was to examine sport psychology consultants’ (SPCs) perceptions of the influence of SPC characteristics on consultant effectiveness, while determining the conditions necessary for establishing an effective consulting relationship. Thirteen accredited SPCs participated in semi-structured interviews. Thematic content analysis identified three characteristics of SPC effectiveness: (a) build a connection with the athlete to create positive change, (b) build a professional consulting relationship with athlete, and (c) consulting relationship meets athletes’ needs. Two aspects emerged as essential for an effective consulting relationship: (a) athlete is an active participant, and (b) SPC awareness of client boundaries of confidentiality. Within sport psychology, research concerns have been raised regarding the need for effective evaluation in this applied field (e.g., Cropley, Miles, Hanton, & Niven, 2007; Martindale & Collins, 2007; Strean, 1998). For example, Hardy and Jones (1994) noted that evaluation is not customary within applied sport psychology settings. The evaluation of the individual sport psychology consultant (SPC) has been largely neglected in favor of assessing the methods employed by these individuals. Andersen (2000) reinforced this point stating that, “Traditionally, the burden of proof and the evidence for the effectiveness of the techniques sport psychologists use stem from models of science that pay maximal attention to the intervention and minimal attention to the human deliverer of that intervention” (p. xiv). To be able to effectively monitor the professional accountability of SPCs, it is essential that the qualities and characteristics necessary for consulting effectiveness are clearly identified. In recent years, substantial progress has been made in identifying the qualities and characteristics necessary for effective sport psychology consulting from the athlete’s perspective (e.g., Anderson, Miles, Robinson, & Mahoney, 2004; Gould, Murphy, Tammen, & May, 1991; Lubker, Visek, Geer, & Watson, 2008; Orlick & Partington, 1987; Tod & Andersen, 2005). For example, Anderson et al. (2004) discovered that elite British athletes regarded the following characteristics to be important for an effective SPC: personable, practical advice, good communicator, knowledgeable about sport psychology, knowledgeable about the athlete’s sport, Received 21 April 2010; accepted 20 April 2010. Address correspondence to Lee-Ann Sharp, Sport and Health Science, University College Plymouth St. Mark and St. John, Derriford Road, Devon, Plymouth PL6 8BH, UK. E-mail: lsharp@marjon.ac.uk 360 CONSULTING EFFECTIVENESS: SPC PERSPECTIVES 361 exhibits professional skills, and honest and trustworthy. Although research that considers the athlete/client’s perspective (i.e., the consumer who is being helped) is important and useful, the opinions of the SPC “practitioners” themselves would also seem to be an important source of information regarding consulting effectiveness. Based on the lived experiences of the individual SPC, these opinions would provide an alternative view of the consulting relationship, from the perspective of the consultant who is offering assistance for his or her client/athlete. However, to date only three descriptive studies have explicitly examined the SPC’s perspective regarding SPC effectiveness (Gould et al., 1991; Lubker et al., 2008; Partington & Orlick, 1991). Although results from these investigations highlighted differences between client and SPC perceptions of the characteristics necessary for consulting effectiveness, there were limited discussions on what SPCs perceived to be essential for effective consulting. In addition to the need to examine the SPC’s contribution to the effectiveness of applied sport psychology, the relationship between the SPC and the athletes they are consulting with has been regarded by a number of authors as a significant component in successful and effective sport psychology consulting (Andersen, 2000; Andersen & Williams-Rice, 1996; Petitpas, Giges, & Danish, 1999). Although there is a growing body of research investigating the eff...