Riedl Nina Ramona, Jansen Petra, Klatt Stefanie
Section Cognition in Team Sports, German Sport University Cologne, 50933, Cologne, Germany.
Department of Sports Science, University of Regensburg, 93053, Regensburg, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2025 Apr 7;15(1):11833. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-96230-0.
Research has indicated that character strengths are relevant to well-being and performance across various life domains; however, they have rarely been considered in the context of sports. The present study examined the potential of character strengths, meaning positive and personally fulfilling traits, in predicting (a) participation in individual/team sports and (b) competition levels among athletes in both individual and team sports. A sample of 683 adults (50.7% women; mean age = 27.9 years), including individual (n = 284) and team sports (n = 399) athletes engaged in different sports and competition levels, completed self-reports assessing their sporting backgrounds. Additionally, the VIA-120 (Values in Action Inventory of Strengths) was employed to measure the 24 character strengths in the VIA classification. The results reveal that (a) a set of character strengths significantly contributes to predicting individual/team sport participation and (b) adding character strengths to the prediction of performance levels leads to a small, albeit non-significant, increase in explained variances. These findings help guide future research on the mechanisms linking character strengths and sports participation and inform the design of personality development and other interventions in sports. While valuable insights are provided, character strengths research in sports should be expanded to include well-being-related outcomes and different methodologies.
研究表明，性格优势与各个生活领域的幸福感和表现相关；然而，它们在体育背景下很少被考虑。本研究考察了性格优势（即积极且能带来个人满足感的特质）在预测（a）参与个人/团队运动以及（b）个人和团队运动运动员的比赛水平方面的潜力。一个由683名成年人（50.7%为女性；平均年龄 = 27.9岁）组成的样本，包括从事不同运动和比赛水平的个人（n = 284）和团队运动（n = 399）运动员，完成了自我报告以评估他们的运动背景。此外，使用了VIA-120（优势行动价值观量表）来测量VIA分类中的24种性格优势。结果显示，（a）一组性格优势对预测个人/团队运动参与有显著贡献，并且（b）在预测表现水平时加入性格优势会使解释方差虽有小幅增加但不显著。这些发现有助于指导未来关于性格优势与运动参与之间联系机制的研究，并为体育领域的个性发展及其他干预措施的设计提供参考。虽然提供了有价值的见解，但体育领域的性格优势研究应扩大到包括与幸福感相关的结果以及不同的方法。
