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New work highlights physical, mental, social benefits of caring climate in sports
LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas professor has contributed to a new edition of a book on sports psychology detailing years of work showing when athletes perceive a caring climate in their sport, the benefits show up on and off the field to affect their physical, mental and social well-being.
Two KU faculty members named University Distinguished Professors
LAWRENCE — Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Barbara A. Bichelmeyer has awarded two University of Kansas faculty members the designation of University Distinguished Professor. The appointments for Heather Desaire in the Department of Chemistry and Erik Perrins in the Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science take effect at the start of the fall 2024 semester.
Full stories below.
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Contact: Mike Krings, KU News Service, 785-864-8860, [email protected], @MikeKrings
New work highlights physical, mental, social benefits of caring climate in sports
LAWRENCE — The story is often told of athletes or coaches who consulted a sports psychologist to help overcome an obstacle to their success on the field. A University of Kansas researcher has contributed to a new edition of a book on psychology in sports detailing years of work showing that when athletes perceive a caring climate in their sport, the benefits show up from the field of play to mental, physical, social and other areas of their lives.
Mary Fry, professor of educational psychology at KU, has long studied a caring, task-involved climate in sport, where the focus is on supporting athletes, caring for them as individuals and encouraging fun and growth instead of placing emphasis on competition and punishing mistakes. She reflects on the research, benefits of a caring environment and how coaches can implement it in a chapter in the new book “Social Psychology in Sport” second edition, edited by Louise David of Umea University in Sweden, Richard Keegan of the University of Canberra in Australia and Sophia Jowett of Loughborough University.
“Writing a review chapter like this gives you a chance to reflect on the work you’ve done, reflect on where we are at, where we’re moving and research directions coming up,” Fry said. “We’ve done almost 20 years of research on caring climates, but it’s still one of the newer areas in motivation. We had a chance here to focus on what we’ve found about the good outcomes when coaches and athletes perceive a caring climate.”
The chapter, written with co-author Lori Gano-Overway of James Madison University, examines those outcomes in detail. Fry and colleagues’ research has shown numerous benefits of a caring climate in social behaviors of athletes, including liking their teammates more, feeling a sense of belonging, compassion for peers, social self-esteem and more prosocial and caring behaviors. In keeping with the book’s theme on sport psychology, Fry’s work has found psychological well-being outcomes such as increased sense of hope and happiness and ability to regulate positive and negative emotional responses.
A big part of any coach’s job is to motivate players, and Fry and Gano-Overway detail findings of increased effort among athletes in the caring climate as well as commitment to continue playing and continued participation in the future. The latter is especially important in youth sports as large numbers of young people decline to continue with a sport at each increase in age ranges, Fry said.
Mental and life skills and physical health have also been positively associated with the caring climate, as studies have shown athletes have improved coping skills, more mindfulness, confidence in their ability to explore future careers after sport, an increased willingness to share concussion symptoms with coaches, increased care for their physical health and returning to play only when fully healed from concussions.
The benefits of a caring sport climate may seem like they should be intuitive, yet an ego-driven climate is often the default, Fry said. And criticism of the approach often claims it is soft or not as likely to be successful in terms or performance or wins and losses. However, study results have shown that when athletes perceive they are in a caring climate, they record more assists, commit fewer turnovers, are more motivated and more likely to feel they reached their full potential during the season.
“It simply makes sense that a climate that makes you feel safe and comfortable in which you’re not afraid of making mistakes enables you to be able to perform better,” Fry said.
In addition to detailing the benefits of a caring climate, the chapter helps detail how coaches can implement the practice with their own teams. By helping coaches understand the theoretical and conceptual underpinnings of why the approach works, the authors also share practical advice on how to tailor the approach through personal and situational factors that will vary by sport, team and athletes taking part.
Fry and Gano-Overway’s chapter is one of four in “Social Psychology in Sport” dealing with motivational considerations. The book also has parts dedicated to relationships in sport, leadership, key social and cognitive processes and the athlete in the wider sport environment.
While results have consistently shown benefits for athletes and coaches, the authors close their chapter discussing future directions for research. Much of the work thus far has been done in a laboratory setting, or with a relatively small number of coaches. Upcoming work will detail how a caring climate implemented throughout a school district with all coaches and teams can be done and what benefits it may have. Other research will examine how an individual’s personality type influences benefits of a caring climate and how interventions can be designed to help coaches and athletes.
“Even in the short interventions we’re seeing compelling results,” Fry said. “What’s of greater interest now is focusing on interventions in the ‘real sports world’ to gather data on results with athletes in this environment and connecting it with coaches in pre and post designs.”
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Contact: Savannah Rattanavong, Office of the Provost, 785-864-6402, [email protected], @KUProvost
Two KU faculty members named University Distinguished Professors
LAWRENCE — Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Barbara A. Bichelmeyer has awarded two University of Kansas faculty members the designation of University Distinguished Professor. The appointments for Heather Desaire in the Department of Chemistry and Erik Perrins in the Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science will be effective at the start of the fall 2024 semester.
“Dr. Desaire and Dr. Perrins have dedicated themselves to their disciplines, contributing meaningfully not only to their respective fields but to the betterment of society,” Bichelmeyer said. “They epitomize KU’s mission to educate leaders, build healthy communities and make discoveries that change the world. I extend my sincere congratulations and appreciation to both of them.”
Nominations of current KU faculty members for distinguished professorships come from academic departments and schools on the Lawrence campus. Major criteria for selection include a record of exceptional scholarship, participation in university affairs and professional organizations, service to community and support for the growth and success of their students, colleagues and the institution. The University Committee on Distinguished Professorships reviews nominations and forwards its recommendations to the provost for final approval.
A complete list of distinguished professors is available online.
About the 2024 University Distinguished Professors
Heather Desaire
Desaire is the Dean’s Professor and Keith D. Wilner Chair in Chemistry. She joined the department in 2002. Her research interests span the fields of glycobiology, mass spectrometry and machine learning.
Desaire manages a research team of professional staff and graduate students who have won multiple research awards over the years. Some of their most recent publications cover detecting the use of generative AI in scientific writing and enabling lipidomic biomarker studies for underserved populations.
She has mentored more than 30 undergraduate researchers, four master’s students and 14 doctoral students who have successfully defended their doctorate under her guidance. Desaire also mentors assistant and associate professors at KU, helping them with successful grant writing.
In addition to having served on several advisory committees at KU, Desaire is the treasurer-elect of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry and has served on more than 40 grant review panels for the National Institutes of Health. She has won a number of awards, including the William T. Kemper Award for Excellence in Teaching, the National Science Foundation CAREER Award and the American Society for Mass Spectrometry Research Award.
Desaire earned her doctorate from the University of California-Berkeley and her bachelor’s degree from Grinnell College.
Erik Perrins
Perrins is a Charles E. & Mary Jane Spahr Professor and is the department chair of electrical engineering and computer science. He joined the department in 2005.
With significant contributions to the telemetry industry, Perrins’ research interests include digital communication theory, advanced modulation techniques, channel coding, synchronization, and multiple-input and multiple-output communications.
Perrins has mentored several junior faculty members, 14 master’s students and seven doctoral students. He has led the establishment of a partnership between KU and the International Foundation for Telemetering that provides significant support for student groups in the School of Engineering.
Perrins is a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the IEEE Communications Society, the IEEE Vehicular Technology Society and the National Spectrum Consortium’s executive committee.
He has served as an area editor for the IEEE Transactions on Communications and president of the Central States Electrical and Computer Engineering Department Heads Association. He has also served in various officer positions for the Communication Theory Technical Committee within the IEEE Communications Society and as the director of the Institute for Information Science’s communications and signal processing lab.
Perrins earned his doctorate, master’s and bachelor’s degrees in electrical engineering from Brigham Young University.
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