Part 3 GLOBAL ISSUES: HARASSMENT AND ABUSE RESEARCH

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With regards to sexual relationships with athletes above the age of consent, opinions ranged from “it would be totally inappropriate” to “it’s a question of civil liberties.” In general, the coaches expressed holding themselves to a higher standard of behaviour compared with how they would judge their fellow coaches. Specifically, some coaches seemed willing to adapt to the pressures generated by greater awareness of child sexual abuse and the emergence of child protection policies in sport by reducing opportunities to develop close relationships with athletes. Coaches also reported that the potential for false accusations, power imbalances and negative performance consequences influenced their own beliefs about whether or not a relationship would be appropriate. However, awareness of career-damaging false accusations and attempts at maintaining civil liberties contributed to the coaches’ stated reluctance to intervene with other coaches when suspicions of inappropriate coach-athlete relationships arise. Role conflict and role ambiguity As we analysed the data from the focus groups, we became aware that the problem most relevant to the research participants was not how they constructed and distinguished appropriate from inappropriate sexual relationships but how child protection initiatives were affecting their roles as swimming coaches. Following the grounded theory methodology, 21, 25, 26 we started with a broad focus allowing the area of concern most important to the coaches to emerge from the data. This core category was labeled role conflict and role ambiguity to reflect how the coaches were questioning their role as a coach after the development of child protection guidelines and increased public scrutiny. The definitions of Kahn and his colleagues 27 were used for role conflict and role ambiguity, with the former referring to conflicting role expectations and the later referring to insufficient information about role expectations. For example, in one of the focus groups, a coach stated, There are going to be some athletes that could be very great athletes but they will fail as athletes, because we will fail them as coaches. Because, we will not be coaching them as to how they need to be coached with some of these rules and regulations. Role conflict and role ambiguity thus became the centre of our grounded theory paradigm model 21 which provided the structure for reporting the findings from 64 64
this study. 14 It is important to note that the elements of the model interact over time to influence the core category. For example, the consequences of a coach’s response to role ambiguity will influence how he experiences role ambiguity and may influence the conditions for experiencing role ambiguity in the future. The starting point for the model is the prerequisite conditions that lead to the coach being aware of child protection issues. The specific conditions that were grounded in the data included: personal experience or knowledge of child protection allegations, increased cultural awareness of child abuse, media coverage of child abuse and increased legislation on child protection issues. These prerequisite conditions influenced the conditions leading to role conflict and ambiguity and included: awareness/acceptance of child protection issues, coaching behaviours and congruence (or incongruence) of coaching behaviours and child protection guidelines. Once role conflict or ambiguity was experienced by the coaches there were three main strategies for attempting to resolve this: first, defining (or redefining) what it means to be an effective coach, secondly assessing one’s own morals standards and intentions and thirdly assessing the risks involved in not adhering to child protection guidelines. Reflections A common limitation of conducting research with humans is that it is difficult to ascertain whether participants are responding openly, or if they are only responding in a socially desirable manner. 28, 29 The use of focus groups potentially increases the likelihood of such responses when participants may be concerned about the other participants unfavourably judging them. While this may have happened to some degree in the focus groups there was sufficient variability in responses to indicate that this was not a serious problem. In two of the individual interviews, however, the lead researcher felt that the participants were withholding information. For example, the convicted coach denied that the abuse happened. In the case of the coach who was cleared of allegations, he was reluctant to talk about the situation, and the researcher did not pressure him into discussing the details of the case. A further limitation is that, as this was an exploratory study, the emerging themes reported in this study are not generalisable to the wider population of 65 65
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Part 3 GLOBAL ISSUES: HARASSMENT AN
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It was in the middle of these early
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more likely to be harassed and/or a
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The survey revealed a considerable
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8. Kirby, S.L. and Greaves, L. ‘F
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Research clearly indicates that rel
Page 13 and 14: performance. Items thrown by the co
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Page 17 and 18: 3.3 Sexual harassment and abuse in
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Page 21 and 22: een harassed and abused by a coach.
Page 23 and 24: The results show that 30% of the st
Page 25 and 26: 3.4 Sexual abuse of athletes in org
Page 27 and 28: conversely, to present the perpetra
Page 29 and 30: staff or volunteers who were not as
Page 31 and 32: 3.5 Sexual harassment and abuse in
Page 33 and 34: automatically mean that he/she will
Page 35 and 36: councilors of NOC*NSF. Solid resear
Page 37 and 38: non-aggressors. Such variables are
Page 39 and 40: 3.6 Risks and opportunities for sex
Page 41 and 42: under the three major headings of
Page 43 and 44: These findings indicated that clubs
Page 45 and 46: Whilst 8% of sports clubs knew of s
Page 47 and 48: 3.7 Sexual harassment among female
Page 49 and 50: slapped on the face, head or ears b
Page 51 and 52: When I was not getting as good achi
Page 53 and 54: 3.8 Unwanted sexual experiences in
Page 55 and 56: 18-21 years old). The VUBrussels sa
Page 57 and 58: Coach behaviour Perceptions Experie
Page 59 and 60: However, KULeuven students’ perce
Page 61 and 62: 7. Leahy, T., Pretty, G., and Tenen
Page 63: Nineteen male swimming coaches part
Page 67 and 68: Finally, it is important to note th
Page 69 and 70: 3.10 What price gold medals? An inv
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Page 73 and 74: symptoms. Lastly, this will only oc
Page 75 and 76: The results from this study may lea
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Part 3 GLOBAL ISSUES: HARASSMENT AND ABUSE RESEARCH

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