1- Narrative inquiry and autobiography

2- Purpose and research questions

3- Methods and methodology

4- Results and discussion

5- Conclusions

References

Abstract

Purpose
There is contentious understanding of the role of sport in adult recreational drug and alcohol addiction recovery. This study explored athlete autobiographies as cultural sites of analysis in relation to the role that one sport (i.e., ultrarunning) plays in addiction recovery capital pathways.
Design
Working at the intersection of an autobiographical approach grounded in relativist narrative inquiry, a social constructionist narrative thematic analysis was conducted of two autobiographies–Catra Corbett and Carlie Engle—about addiction recovery through ultrarunning (i.e., distances of 43 km or more). The narratives used to construct life transformation and recovery capital in relation to ultrarunning were centralized in the analysis using Frank’s (2013) work on illness narratives and the body.
Results
Two narrative themes threaded athletes’ addiction recovery journeys: chaos narrative and quest narrative. Two sub-themes related to fluid identity transformation intertwined with ultrarunning were identified within these narratives: 1. ‘addict-runner’ (chaos) and 2. ‘addict runner to ultra-runner’ (quest). Nuanced meanings of suffering were connected to identity transformation and running and two forms of addiction recovery capital: human (e.g., psychological adjustment, life perspective) and social (e.g., family connection, community).
Conclusions
The research findings provide insight into the role of sport in psychosocial aspects of addiction recovery using an autobiographical approach grounded in narrative theory. This study also extends work in sport psychology focusing on autobiographies as research and pedagogical resources to learn more about athlete mental health.

Narrative inquiry and autobiography

Given the contentious role of sport in the alcohol and drug addiction recovery process, one way to expand this understanding is to use narrative inquiry. Narrative inquiry is a theoretical approach making inroads in sport psychology to learn about athlete identities by focusing on stories (Douglas & Carless, 2015; Smith & Sparkes, 2009). Stories are prioritized as sites of analysis within narrative inquiry because people use them to make sense of who they are (i.e., self-identities) and in so doing, draw on particular narratives made socially and culturally available (McGannon & Smith, 2015; Smith & Sparkes, 2009In this sense narratives– and the stories told within them– are resources and ‘actors’ because they have the capacity to do things; narratives shape identities, behaviour, experiences and emotions through telling and witnessing of stories (Frank, 2013; Smith & Sparkes, 2009). The present study was grounded in a relativist ontology and social constructionist epistemology, with narratives viewed as constructing self-identity and experiences, in contrast to self-identity being conceptualized within the mind of the individual in post-positivism (McGannon & Smith, 2015; Smith & Sparkes, 2009). From a relativist ontology, the focus “shifts from selves and identities as individualistic, real, and interior-based, to them being constructions derived from narratives and performed in relationships” (Smith & Sparkes, 2009, p. 5).

Practical implications

Introduction

Materials and methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusions

Acknowledgements

References

Objectives The aim of this study was to investigate whether 4 weeks of endurance training could improve tolerance to mental exertion in untrained participants. Design Longitudinal training study. Method Twenty untrained young adults (14 F, 6 M; 27.6 ± 6.2 years) completed a 4-week training protocol in a randomised and counterbalanced order. Baseline and follow-up assessment were conducted over three sessions in the week preceding and following the training period. During session 1, participants completed an incremental maximal ramp test. During sessions 2 and 3 participants completed a 15 min cycling time trial preceded by either a mental exertion or control conditions. Following baseline assessments, participants were randomised into a physical training or placebo group that completed the training intervention thrice weekly over four weeks. Results The physical training resulted in increases in VO2peak relative to the placebo group (p = 0.003). Linear mixed models utilising the control condition time trial performance as a covariate found the physical training group increased their time trial distance following the mental exertion condition to a greater extent than the placebo group (p = 0.03). RPE during the time trial and perceptual measures of mental exertion did not significantly change between groups (all p > 0.10) although interaction effects were observed when considering the RPE-power output relationship during the time trial. Conclusions Four weeks of endurance training increased tolerance to mental exertion in untrained participants during a subsequent physical performance, but not during prolonged cognitive performance. This finding suggests that the ability to tolerate mental exertion is trainable in at least some contexts and highlights the far-reaching benefits of endurance training.

Introduction

Endurance exercise training results in adaptations to the neuromuscular, metabolic, cardiovascular, respiratory and endocrine systems as reflected in improvements in key parameters of aerobic fitness, exercise economy and lactate/ventilatory threshold 1. Aside from these traditional, peripherally-based adaptations, endurance exercise is linked to cognitive benefits 2,3 as well as structural 4 and functional changes in the brain 5. These observations appear consistent with adaptations that, among other benefits, would confer improved efficiency and/or capacity for mental work. Brain adaptations to physical training could therefore also be important in our resistance to mental fatigue. Acute mental fatigue is defined as a psychobiological state that may arise during or after prolonged cognitive activities; it is characterized by feelings of tiredness or exhaustion, and a decreased commitment and increased aversion to continue the current activity 6. Acute mental fatigue has an adverse effect on cognitive function 7,8 and endurance performance 9. Mental fatigue appears to impair endurance performance through an increased perception of effort during subsequent physical exercise. However, a physiological reason for an increase in perceived exertion has, to date, only been postulated 10 . Beyond the physiological mechanism of mental fatigue, it is important to understand whether the ability to resist mental fatigue is associated with a genetic predisposition or displays a trainable phenotype.

1- Introduction

2- Materials and methods

3- Discussion

References

Abstract

Background: Lewy Body dementia (LBD) is the second most prevalent neurodegenerative dementia. This form of dementia is notable for an aggressive disease course consisting of a combination of cognitive, Parkinsonian, affective, and physiological symptoms that significantly increase morbidity and mortality, and decrease life expectancy in this population compared to more common dementias. Additionally, those diagnosed with LBD are often excluded from trials evaluating exercise in similar diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease or Parkinson’s disease due to the complexity and concurrency of motor and cognitive symptoms. Consequently, there is scarce research evaluating the effect of exercise on individuals with LBD.
Methods: The PRomoting Independence in Lewy Body Dementia through Exercise (PRIDE) trial is a novel non-randomised, crossover pilot study consisting of an 8-week wait-list usual care period, followed by an 8-week exercise intervention targeting progressive resistance and balance training. The trial aim is to evaluate the effect of exercise on the primary outcome of functional independence and secondary outcomes including cognitive, physical, psychosocial and quality of life measures in people living with LBD and their caregivers. The intervention involves 3 supervised 1-hour sessions per week (24 sessions in total) administered by an Accredited Exercise Physiologist in a clinical facility at the University of Sydney in Lidcombe, Australia.
Discussion: The PRIDE study is the first controlled trial to evaluate a robust exercise intervention within a LBD cohort and will provide crucial information required to inform robust future clinical trials.

Introduction

Lewy body dementia (LBD) is an umbrella term for the diseases of dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), and Parkinson’s disease dementia (PDD) which share common pathology, and have a variable estimated prevalence of up to 24% of all dementia diagnosis(1). LBD has complex, fluctuating symptomatology, including parkinsonism, psychosis, autonomic and cognitive impairments; with afflicted individuals progressing more rapidly to residential care and death following diagnosis(2). The prevalence of frailty in early LBD (37%) is double that of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) or Parkinson’s disease (PD)(3, 4), and strongly associated with neuropsychiatric disturbances, poorer prognosis, lower quality of life and ultimately a reduction in functional independence(2). Importantly, the rapid development of frailty in LBD is only minimally attributable to disease pathophysiology itself(5), with a greater involvement stemming from potentially treatable and highly prevalent risk factors in LBD including malnutrition, sarcopenia, delirium, infection, polypharmacy, injurious falls and behavioural disturbances(6-11). However, current treatments for LBD are predominantly pharmacological with significant risk of adverse outcomes, and do not effectively address the development of these risk factors or frailty in this cohort(12, 13).

1- INTRODUCTION

2- METHODS

3- RESULTS

4- DISCUSSION

5- CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

Abstract

Background
Prospective cohorts have suggested that physical activity (PA) can decrease the risk of incident anxiety. However, no meta‐analysis has been conducted.
Aims
To examine the prospective relationship between PA and incident anxiety and explore potential moderators.
Methods
Searches were conducted on major databases from inception to October 10, 2018 for prospective studies (at least 1 year of follow‐up) that calculated the odds ratio (OR) of incident anxiety in people with high PA against people with low PA. Methodological quality was assessed using the Newcastle‐Ottawa Scale (NOS). A random‐effects meta‐analysis was conducted and heterogeneity was explored using subgroup and meta‐regression analysis.
Results
Across 14 cohorts of 13 unique prospective studies (N = 75,831, median males = 50.1%) followed for 357,424 person‐years, people with high self‐reported PA (versus low PA) were at reduced odds of developing anxiety (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 0.74; 95% confidence level [95% CI] = 0.62, 0.88; crude OR = 0.80; 95% CI = 0.69, 0.92). High self‐reported PA was protective against the emergence of agoraphobia (AOR = 0.42; 95% CI = 0.18, 0.98) and posttraumatic stress disorder (AOR = 0.57; 95% CI = 0.39, 0.85). The protective effects for anxiety were evident in Asia (AOR = 0.31; 95% CI = 0.10, 0.96) and Europe (AOR = 0.82; 95% CI = 0.69, 0.97); for children/adolescents (AOR = 0.52; 95% CI = 0.29, 0.90) and adults (AOR = 0.81; 95% CI = 0.69, 0.95). Results remained robust when adjusting for confounding factors. Overall study quality was moderate to high (mean NOS = 6.7 out of 9).
Conclusion
Evidence supports the notion that self‐reported PA can confer protection against the emergence of anxiety regardless of demographic factors. In particular, higher PA levels protects from agoraphobia and posttraumatic disorder.

INTRODUCTION

Anxiety disorders are common and burdensome across the world (Baxter, Vos, Scott, Norman, et al., 2014; Baxter, Vos, Scott, Ferrari, & Whiteford, 2014). The point prevalence varies across world regions, ranging between 2.1% (range, 1.8–2.5%) in East Asia up to 6.1% (range, 5.1–7.4%) in North Africa/Middle East (Baxter, Vos, Scott, Ferrari, et al., 2014; Baxter, Vos, Scott, Norman, et al., 2014). The prevalence of anxiety symptoms is even higher, at approximately 11% worldwide (Stubbs, Koyanagi et al., 2017). Globally, anxiety disorders are the sixth leading cause of disability regarding years of life lived with disability across all ages, and fourth in adults (18–49 years; Meier et al., 2016). In addition, anxiety disorders are associated with a 39% and 146% increased risk of premature mortality from natural causes and unnatural causes, respectively (Meier et al., 2016). People with anxiety disorders are at higher risk of cardiometabolic diseases, such as diabetes and acute cardiac events (Edmondson & von Kanel, 2017; Smith, Deschenes, & Schmitz, 2018). This is potentially due to shared etiological biological factors between anxiety and cardiovascular disorders (e.g., increased inflammation and oxidative stress; Belem da Silva et al., 2017), but also due to modifiable risk behaviors like lower physical activity (PA) levels and increased sedentary behavior (Stubbs, Koyanagi et al., 2017; Vancampfort, Stubbs, Herring, Hallgren, & Koyanagi, 2018). Although several previous cross‐sectional studies suggest that people with anxiety disorders or higher levels of anxiety symptoms are more likely to engage in lower levels of PA (22.9% versus 16.6%; Dillon, McMahon, O’Regan, & Perry, 2018; Stubbs, Koyanagi et al., 2017) and spend more time in sedentary activities when compared with people without anxiety (Dillon et al., 2018; Teychenne, Costigan, & Parker, 2015; Vancampfort et al., 2016, 2018), PA is not always inversely associated with anxiety symptoms (Nguyen et al., 2013).

Objectives: Elite team-sport athletes are frequently exposed to stressors that have the potentialto depress immunity and increase infection risk. Therefore, the purpose of this review is to describe how team-sport stressors impact upon immune responses, along with exploring whether alterations in these markers have the potential to predict upper respiratory tract illness symptoms. Design: Narrative review. Methods: Salivary secretory immunoglobulin A (SIgA) and T-cell markers have been shown to predict infection risk in individual endurance athletes. Papers discussing the impact of team-sport stressors on SIgA and T-cells were discussed in the review, studies discussing other aspects of immunity were excluded. Journal articles were sourced from PubMed, Web of science and Scopus. Key search terms included team-sport athletes, stressors, immunity, T-cells, cytokines, SIgA and upper respiratory illness. Results: Most team-sport stressors appear to increase risk for illness. An association between reduced SIgA and increased illness incidence has been demonstrated. Intensive training and competition periods have been shown to reduce SIgA, however, itis less clear how additional stressors including extreme environmental conditions, travel, psychological stress, sleep disturbance and poor nutrition affect immune responses. Conclusions: Monitoring SIgA may provide an assessment of a team-sport athletes risk status for developing upper respiratory tract symptoms, however there is currently not enough evidence to suggest SIgA alone can predict illness. Team-sport stressors challenge immunity and it is possible that the combination of stressors could have a compounding effect on immunodepression and infection risk. Given that illness can disrupt training and performance, further research is required to better elucidate how stressors individually and collectively influence immunity and illness.

Introduction

Athletes are continually exposed to stressors that have the potential to depress immune functions and increase infection risk, particularly upper respiratory tract infections (URTI) or the common cold. Indeed, acute URTI is the most common infectious illness reportedinelite athletes.1 Illness is of great concernfor athletes as it can disrupttraining and performance.1 To understand why athletes appear to have a heightened risk for infection, the field of exercise immunology emerged. Studies in this area have been largely concerned with identifying immune markers that can be used to predict athletes’ susceptibility to illness, mostly in endurance athletes. Specifically, mucosal immunity and T-cell cytokine responses have been found to be key determinants of URTI risk in athletes participating in individual endurance sports.2 However, there is comparatively little research in team-sport athletes, therefore whether such immune markers influence a team-sport athletes risk for URTI remains unclear. Team-sport athletes are an important populationto investigate as their closeproximity to teammates and other athletes (e.g. shaking hands, contact sports, changing rooms) may increase their exposure to infection-causing pathogens. Furthermore, team-sport athletes are continually exposed to a range of stressors which may depress immune responses. Such stressors include training, competition,travel, environmental extremes, psychological stress, sleep deprivation, poor nutrition and excessive alcohol consumption. It is possible that the combination of these stressors could amplify immunodepression, resulting in greater URTI risk than if each stressor were applied alone. The purpose of this review is to describe how team-sport stressors impact upon salivary secretory immunoglobulin A (SIgA) and T-cell responses, along with exploring whether alterations in these markers have the potential to predict infection risk. Finally, strategies to counteract the potential immunodepression evoked by these stressors will be proposed.

Youth sport is a key developmental context for many reasons, including the opportunities it provides for building relationships with peers and its potential to support character development. Peers can influence adolescent sport experiences and shape their motivations, and different peer motivational climates may differentially support athlete character. Established models identify different dimensions of peer motivational climate, yet these models do not describe how aspects of peer climate may align with character. We therefore assess profiles of peer motivational climate in relation to a multi-dimensional practitioner-developed theoretical model for character development through sport. Participants were 655 adolescent athletes from the greater Boston area, in the United States. Athletes perceiving a mastery-involved peer climate, even with high intra-team competition, were most likely to exhibit positive character attributes at the three levels of character assessed: themselves, their teammates, and the game. This study also demonstrates the utility of practitioner-developed models for adolescent research.

Peer motivational climate

The fact that peers can influence youth experiences in sport contexts, and help to shape their motivations, is well established (e.g., Ntoumanis & Vazou, 2005; Vazou, Ntoumanis, & Duda, 2005). Prior research refers to the motivational climate as comprising the norms and expectations of the team for either performance/ego orientation (emphasizing social comparison) or mastery/task orientation (emphasizing personal improvement; Ames, 1992). Peers play an important role in shaping motivational climates (Ntoumanis & Vazou, 2005; Vazou et al., 2005) and, in turn, the motivational climate can influence youth outcomes and experiences in sport. In particular, motivational climates involving peers with performance/ego orientations have been associated with burnout (Smith, Gustafsson, & Hassmén, 2010), whereas climates promoting mastery/task orientations have been associated with increased self-esteem and commitment to sport (Vazou et al., 2005), and intrinsic motivation (Jõesaar, Hein, & Hagger, 2011). Prior studies have also shown that youth perceptions of their team’s peer motivational climate were associated with factors at various levels. At the individual level, athletes’ achievement orientations were associated with perceptions of peer motivational climate, such that athletes with high task orientation and low ego orientation were most likely to perceive high task-involving peer climates (Vazou, 2010). At the team level, having a successful season record or having a female coach was associated with higher perceptions of task-involving peer climates compared to teams with less successful records or male coaches (Vazou, 2010). Finally, at the level of how athletes approach the game, ego-oriented peer climates have been associated with increased gamesmanship (i.e., tactics aiming to gain psychological advantage; Ntoumanis, Taylor, & Thøgersen-Ntoumani, 2012). However, no team has a singular, uniform peer motivational climate; athletes on the same team may perceive different peer motivational climates (Vazou, Ntoumanis, & Duda, 2006) and those subjective experiences should be taken into consideration to understand links between team motivational climate and the behavior or development of individual athletes.

Objectives: The current study examined prosocial and antisocial behaviors from teammates as predictors of within-person differences over time in self-reported prosocial and antisocial teammate behaviors toward teammates and social identity strength. Design: Over a 10-day period, a daily diary approach was used to collect 848 observations from 100; male, n = 45; female, n = 55 youth hockey athletes who were between 11 and 17 years of age (Mage = 13.24, SD = 1.83). Method: Participants completed daily diaries related to their experiences of prosocial and antisocial behavior from teammates, the prosocial and antisocial behaviors they directed toward teammates, and social identity strength. Linear mixed-level modelling was used to examine how daily experiences of moral behavior from teammates over-time were linked to within-person differences in moral behaviors toward teammates and social identity strength. Results: Multilevel analyses showed significant within-person variance in athletes’ moral behaviors toward teammates and their social identity strength. These differences were predicted by daily experiences of prosocial and antisocial behavior from teammates. Athletes reported a stronger social identity on days they experienced a higher number of prosocial behaviors, and a weaker social identity on days they experienced a higher number of antisocial behaviors. The frequency of daily experienced prosocial and antisocial behaviors interacted in predicting self-reported prosocial and antisocial behaviors toward teammates. Conclusion: Daily prosocial and antisocial behaviors from teammates are systematically related to the ways that athletes behave toward their teammates as well as the strength with which they identify with their sport team.

Introduction

Scholars have called for greater attention to how the social environments in sport teams contribute to athlete experiences (Martin, Bruner, Eys, & Spink, 2014; Smith, 2003). A social environment refers to the nature of interactions as well as the quality of ongoing interpersonal relationships among social actors in a particular social setting (Shaw, 1981). Thus, the social environments within sport teams are neither monolithic (i.e., sport teams have distinct social environments), nor are they experienced uniformly by athletes (i.e., individual experiences differ as a result of how one interacts with others in the group) (Holt, Black, Tamminen, Fox, & Mandigo, 2008). Several lines of inquiry evidence the significance of athletes’ social environments on cognitive, affective, and behavioral outcomes. Examples include research showing positive links between attraction to the task aspects of a team and the use of more adaptive pre-competition coping strategies (Wolf, Eys, Sadler, & Kleinert, 2015), general psychological need satisfaction and emotional regulation (Taylor & Bruner, 2012), and perceived sociomoral atmosphere and prosocial behavior (Rutten et al., 2007). Moreover, the social environments within youth sport teams may be particularly consequential for athletes. Relationships outside the family unit become increasingly salient during adolescence, with peer acceptance surfacing as a highly relevant goal for youth (Harris, 1995). Theoretical accounts from developmental and social psychological perspectives cast the interaction between individuals and their peers as a key issue relevant to social behavior (e.g., Bandura, 1991) and youth development more generally (e.g., Brown, 2004; Harris, 1995).

The behavior of football fans began to be viewed as a growing social problem in many countries in the 1960s (Davis, 2015). Prior to this period, however, conduct that might now be framed as football violence in England was instead typically portrayed by the British press as “high-spirited” (Dunning, Murphy & Williams, 1988, p. 11). Football crowds were expected to behave in a “rough” manner, and as such any instances reported in the press were not usually perceived to be reflective of a serious social problem. Until the late 1950s, match attendance in English football (and in many other domestic leagues in Europe where “hooliganism” emerged) was primarily confined to relatively localized support (Goldblatt, 2008). Alterations in employment conditions subsequently enabled increasing numbers (primarily working-class males) to travel to matches as “away fans” (Rookwood, 2009). Supporters would travel together, often in “mob-like” groups, their presence helping to alter the dynamics of football spectatorship. Violent football gangs emerged at most English clubs from the 1960s, although the phenomenon was usually confined to professional football. Many of these socially organized or institutionalized groups (which became known as “firms”) began to engage in vandalism and competitive violence, primarily against other football gangs. Some Liverpool and Manchester United supporters were early English examples, with sections of a changing media labeling the respective groups the “Merseyside Maniacs” and the “Red Army” as a consequence (Dunning et al., 1988, p. 142). Various football firms across England and Europe adopted different practices and labels. In European fandom, violent groups often became associated with a name connected to a particular part of the stadium where they congregated to watch matches. In English contexts, some firms have maintained an attachment to a particular label over a number of years. However, many of these groups are small, transitory, and relatively short-lived gangs seeking “hyper-localized notoriety” (Redhead, 2015, p. 336). In his archiving of “hooligan memoirs,” Redhead identifies 400 separate firm names in English football alone. The reflexive subcultural language employed here is an interesting component of the phenomenon itself. Firms of violent supporters have often adopted names to describe connections to given identities or practices (Davis, 2015) or to confuse perceived “enemies,” namely rival firms, the media, the police, and even academics (Redhead, 2015).

Conflicts in high-performance sports (HPS) can be tense and emotionally charged experiences for athletes, coaches, and the national and international sports federations (NSOs and IFs) involved. Such disputes raise intriguing challenges for the mediators and arbitrators charged with handling them. These disputes typically involve multiple parties, many of whom have intensely competitive personalities, and may be spread across the globe. These issues are often high-stakes and win/lose in nature. And the mediator will typically confront numerous process challenges, such as timelines that are sometimes measured in hours, jurisdictional issues, and the rigid rules and standards of various governing bodies. Mediation has proven to be a successful tool for both managing and resolving these challenging disputes, often in creative ways that repair and preserve relationships (Blackshaw 2002). The ability of good mediators to adapt to and deal with the peculiar challenges of high-performance sports disputes and to manage the unique dynamics of sports disputes is critical for mediation success in this arena. Two variables that, unsurprisingly, appear to affect mediation settlement rates significantly are the degree of difficulty of the issue, and whether it is a win/lose distributive problem such as team selection, although other factors also play a role. In this article, I have examined cases mediated through the Sport Dispute Resolution Centre of Canada (SDRCC) to identify a range of successful mediation strategies for managing the challenges of these disputes. These best practices take into consideration my own experience as well as feedback from parties, national sports organizations, and fellow mediators. Mediation is currently not widely used around the world for resolving amateur and professional sports disputes, but I believe that it will likely become increasingly useful both nationally and internationally (Mew and Richards 2005; Blackshaw 2009, 2013, 2014; Mavromati 2015). Currently, most professional sports do not widely use mediation as a formal part of their dispute resolution processes, although informal forms of dispute resolution may well be used, and parties do sometimes opt to mediate in individual cases (Bucher 2011). As a result, both amateur and professional sports represent tremendous growth areas for the use of mediation. In recognition of this opportunity, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) introduced newly amended mediation rules in 2013, which were updated further in 2016 after consultation with and input from CAS mediators. The court has also begun a push to increase the use of mediation by rejuvenating its mediation roster in the last several years and by educating the sports community about mediation (Blackshaw 2013, 2014; Mavromati 2015).