Among 11 UK-based talent-development coaches, dealing with athletes' mental health issues was not considered part of their role, highlighting a need for context-specific knowledge and tools.
Talent-development coaches feel unequipped and do not consider dealing with mental health issues as part of their role, highlighting a need for context-specific training and interventions.
This study explored talent-development coaches’ experiences of athletes having faced mental health issues (MHIs). A second objective was to allow participants to share their opinion on how sport environments could improve the support offered to coaches and athletes encountering MHIs. A thematic analysis was performed on 11 verbatim-transcribed interviews conducted with UK-based talent-development coaches. While monitoring and supporting their athletes’ performance and well-being were viewed as day-to-day practice, dealing with MHIs was, however, not considered part of their role for a variety of reasons. Findings also suggest that coaches need more suitable and context-specific knowledge and tools to appropriately respond to and support their athletes. Generating a better understanding of coaches’ perceived role, knowledge, and needs to adequately support their athletes suffering from MHIs is crucial for the design of sport-specific interventions and for the athletes themselves.
Lebrun et al. (Sun,) conducted a other in Mental health issues (n=11). Among 11 UK-based talent-development coaches, dealing with athletes' mental health issues was not considered part of their role, highlighting a need for context-specific knowledge and tools.
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