The Role of Sport Culture in Supporting or Hindering Mental Health and Performance: Voices of Canadian High-Performance Athletes
Rachel Jewett et al.
What the paper says
We know that athlete mental health (MH) is influenced by a range of stressors, however, the impact of sport culture is less understood. The purpose of this study was to explore Canadian athletes’ experiences regarding the interplay between their sport culture, sport performance, and mental triad profile (MH, mental performance, mental illness symptoms). Semistructured interviews were conducted with 22 athletes who were training for the Tokyo ( n = 13) or Beijing ( n = 9) Olympic/Paralympic Games. Using a reflexive thematic analysis, characteristics of sport cultures perceived as supportive and nonsupportive of favorable mental triad and sport performance profiles were identified. Themes were woven into four composite vignettes representing the perspectives of athletes with varying profiles and performance experiences. Vignettes underscore the importance of integrating MH literacy as a core educational component within sport environments, linking MH and mental performance, and establishing sport cultures that prioritize transparency, communication, and support.
Evidence weight
Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40
| F · citation impact | 0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20 |
| M · momentum | 0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07 |
| V · venue signal | 0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03 |
| R · text relevance † | 0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20 |
† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.