Objectives
Research shows that adolescent athletes face mental health challenges associated with the practice of sports. Recent studies have highlighted the benefits of mindfulness, acceptance, and compassion skills in athletes. However, the impact of these processes has never been tested in a combined and structured manner. The PLAYwithHEART programme is a structured, group-based intervention encompassing eight weekly sessions to be delivered to adolescent athletes. This study aimed to explore the feasibility of this programme through a non-randomized design and assess pre- and post-programme and 6-month follow-up changes, through assessments of athletes’ sports anxiety, quality of life, mindfulness, psychological inflexibility, self-compassion, shame, and self-criticism.
Method
Athletes were recruited through sports clubs in the geographical center of Portugal. A final sample of 50 participants was assigned to one of two conditions: experimental group (who participated in the programme) or control group (in the waitlist control condition). Feasibility was assessed according to commonly used guidelines for feasibility studies. Intervention effects were tested through a 3 × 2 mixed MANOVA repeated measures.
Results
Results for the intervention feasibility were encouraging, and PLAYwithHEART was successful in significantly increasing athletes’ mindfulness and self-compassion skills and decreasing self-criticism and sports anxiety with medium effect size. A majority of gains were maintained on follow-up assessment.
Conclusions
This new integrative intervention appears useful in helping adolescent athletes deal with the challenges and demands of sports context. This study holds significant practical and theoretical implications within the realm of applied psychology in sports.