General self-efficacy in the cross-sectional indirect association of emotion suppression with athlete burnout among individual sport athletes

The aim of this study is to examine a cross-sectional indirect association involving general self-efficacy in the relationship between emotion suppression and athlete burnout. A total of 336 athletes aged 18–34 years (M = 22.07, SD = 4.27) participated in the study, including 184 women (54.8%) and 152 men (45.2%). The athletes’ training experience ranged from 10 to 444 months (M = 90.54, SD = 61.85). Participants represented fifteen individual sports disciplines. The results indicated a significant association between emotion suppression and athlete burnout through general self-efficacy, with negative associations observed both between emotion suppression and self-efficacy, and between self-efficacy and burnout. Detailed analyses indicated significant associations through general self-efficacy linking anger suppression and depressive emotion suppression with the specific dimensions of athlete burnout. In each case, anger suppression and depressive emotion suppression were negatively related to self-efficacy, while self-efficacy was negatively associated with burnout dimensions. However, no significant association was found for anxiety suppression – the indirect association between anxiety suppression and burnout through general self-efficacy was not statistically significant. These findings indicate that the suppression of anger and depressive affect is cross-sectionally associated with lower general self-efficacy, and that lower general self-efficacy, which is concurrently associated with higher levels of athlete burnout, whereas anxiety suppression is not significantly associated with a comparable pattern of indirect associations.