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Perfectionism and emotion regulation in coaches: A test of the 2 × 2 model of dispositional perfectionism

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Abstract

The manner in which coaches regulate their emotions has implications for their performance and well-being. Drawing on research that has found perfectionism to predict emotion regulation in other settings, this study adopted the 2 × 2 model of perfectionism to examine whether subtypes of perfectionism among coaches were associated with variation in the use of emotion regulation strategies. Coaches (N = 238, M age = 23.92, SD = 10.32) from various sports completed measures of perfectionism (personal standards and evaluative concerns) and emotion regulation strategies (expressive suppression, cognitive reappraisal, and control of anger directed inwards and outwards). Moderated hierarchical regression provided mixed support for the 2 × 2 model. As expected, pure personal standards perfectionism (high standards/low concerns) was generally associated with the highest capacity for emotion regulation and pure evaluative concerns perfectionism (low standards/high concerns) with the lowest. Unexpectedly, mixed perfectionism (high standards/high concerns) was associated with the highest level of expressive suppression, suggesting that in some instances standards might exacerbate rather than attenuate concerns.

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Notes

  1. Exploration of this model to identify areas of misfit indicated that none of the standardized residual covariances exceeded 2.58 but two exceeded 1.96 (personal standards with parental pressure = −2.30 and personal standards with concern over mistakes = 2.30) and therefore provided two statistically significant discrepancies in the implied and observed data (Byrne 2001). Modification indices indicated that improvement in fit (so to exceed conventional criteria for ‘good’ fit) would be gained through re-specification of the model allowing for cross-loading of some of the sub-dimensions of perfectionism on latent factors (notably an inverse loadings of parental pressure on PSP and positive loading of concern over mistakes on PSP): χ2 (6) = 19.51, CFI = .97, TLI = .92, RMSEA = .10, 90 % CI .05–.15, SRMR = .05. Given that the assumption of zero cross-loadings may be overly restrictive in this context (Marsh et al. 2009), the observed fit here was considered acceptable.

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Hill, A.P., Davis, P.A. Perfectionism and emotion regulation in coaches: A test of the 2 × 2 model of dispositional perfectionism. Motiv Emot 38, 715–726 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-014-9404-7

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