Cooperative responses in competitive soccer

• Main Author: Williamson, Rodney Gordon
• Format: Others
• Published: PDXScholar 1986
• Subjects: Cooperativeness; Soccer; Psychology; Sports Studies
• Online Access: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/3692; https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4701&context=open_access_etds

The purpose of this study was to discover patterns in intra-team co operation (passing) versus individualistic behavior (dribbling) across various age and gender groups . A behavioral coding scheme for soccer players in possession of the ball was designed to tabulate team responses of passing or dribbling behavior in a four-a-side indoor tournament . A total of 32 teams , 18 male teams and 14 female teams , participated in four age brackets. A multi variate analysis of variance (MANOVA) generated one significant result for age and passing behavior. This supported the first hypothesis that intra-team cooperative behavior increased with age. Due to the nonorthogonal nature of the data two separate analyses of variance (ANOVA) were conducted, one for each of_ the dependent variables. No significant results were generated by these ANOVA's for sex and dribbling behavior. However, there was tenuous confirmation of the second hypothesis, that there is a gender difference in the use of cooperative (passing) responses and individualistic (dribbling) behavior.