Social and personal motives of athletes aged 16-18

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the social and personal motives of athletics and motivational attitudes towards competitive activity among athletes aged 16-18. The experimental sample included 24 athletes who were divided into two groups depending on their level of sportsmanship. The obtained data revealed the similarities and differences in the dominance of social and personal motives of athletes-ath- letes. It was found that the higher the level of skill, the more pronounced the motive for achieving success for athletes and athletes. This means that athletes of higher categories are more active, persistent, more persistent in achieving their goals and more stable in stress-competitive conditions. Among first-grade athletes, mixed motivation dominates, which is characterized by actions to think about possible failures, encourages them to carefully process the exercise technique, think over the tactics of competitive ac- tions, and collect information about their opponents. It is noted that motivation for professional activity is one of the conditions for the longevity of athletes if they combine sports and educational activities. It has also been proved that it is with athletes of lower grades, due to their insufficiently expressed attitude towards achieving success, that it is necessary to carry out purposeful psychological and pedagogical work on the part of the coach.

Key words: social and personal motives, athletes, athletics, achieving success.