Career transition. Flashcards
What is career transition?
Leaving professional sport for another career - transition can be voluntary or forced.
Often neglected by sporting organisations, whose primary focus is maximising athletes performance. - When athletes leave they turn focus on new current athletes.
What is social gerontology ?
The view focuses on aging and considers life satisfaction as being dependent on characteristics of the sport experience. six social gerontological perspectives have been offered most applicable to sport experience:
Disengagement theory, subculture theory, activity theory continuity theory, exchange theory, social breakdown theory
Describe retirement as transition.
Viewpoint that retirement is not an abrupt event, but a gradual process. Instead of relinquishing goals and interests there is alteration. Uses schlossberg’s model of human adaptation to transition. (but keep in mind that actually sometimes retirement is forced and abrupt - so limited in research)
Describe thanatology.
Retirement akin to death, social isolation and rejection from former in group.
List the 5 stages of the conceptual model of career transition.
- Causes of career termination.
- Factors of adaptation.
- Available resources for adaptation.
- Quality of career transition.
- Intervention for career transition.
Who does age impact retirement?
Age or the decline in performance because of advancing age is a primary cause of retirement.
Includes physiological, psychological and social elements - ramifications for both young and adults.
as age - more likely to loose motivation.
How does deselection contribute to causes of termination?
Not being selected for the team. Level of competition - disregard for those not able to meet the necessary performance criteria.
Describe free choice in relation to sport termination?
Voluntarily choosing to leave for a variety of personal, social or sport reasons.
Describe other reasons for causes of termination?
Family reasons, problems with coach/organisation, financial difficulties, perhaps drug use.
Describe factors related to adaption to career transition.
Developmental contributors - how athletes were brought up in sport, single-minded pursuit of excellence could be problematic for transition.
Self-identity - degree to which athlete defines their self-worth in terms of sport.
Perceived control - whether athlete chooses to leave or is forced to leave.
Social identity - loss of popularity, inhibited ability to interact with others outside of sport.
Tertiary contributions - SES, martial status, competitive level, age, overall health, gender/race/culture.
Describe stage 3 of the conceptual model for career transition.
Available resources for adaptation.
Coping strategies - means of making the necessary changes to effectively transition out of sport and reduce the likeihood of difficulties.
Give an example of a coping strategy.
Finding another focus of interest, maintaining a training/exercise regime, altering self-perception, cognitive restructuring, goal setting for new career.
Social support - often athletes entire social network is based on sporting life (might change once popularity is gone).- eg. having a good coach-athlete relationship where athletes can seek transition advice from coaches has been shown to be helpful
Preretirement planning - helps to have the perceptive that they can now broaden their sense of self-identity. Becomes a difficult issue when athletes resist or deny retirement and fail to create a plan
Give an example of preretirement planning.
Continuing education, occupational or investment opportunities, social networking, money management and long-term financial planning.
Describe stage 4 of the career transition model.
Quality of career transition.
A variety of factors will determine the nature of an athletes transition - psychological, social and environmental.
presence/absence of some factors dictate whether a transition is healthy or distressing.
It may be more likely for transitions to be distressful among elite - amateur or professional athletes due to greater life investment
Describe stage 5 of the career transition model.
Difficult to complete.
Sport psychology consultants have little contact with athletes in this stage. Many organisations do not offer time/money for career transition.
Assisting athletes in maining self-worth and establishing new identity.
Possible strategies - cognitive restructing. Stress management. Emotional expression. Broadening their social identity.
