Coach and Athlete Burnout - West Virginia University

emotional exhaustion and lower levels of personal accomplishments than their male
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counterpart. No gender differences were found regarding the depersonalization subscale.
Similar results have been mirrored by other studies regarding the emotional exhaustion
subscale (Kelley, 1994; Kelley et al., 1999; Pastore & Judd, 1993; Vealey et al., 1992).
However, Pastore and Judd (1993) and Vealey and colleagues (1992) failed to
demonstrate any gender differences regarding the personal accomplishment subscale.
Where these studies have found no gender differences in depersonalization, others have
suggested males experience greater levels of depersonalization than females (Dale &
Weinberg, 1989). It is not surprising that the present study failed to reveal gender
differences on any of the three burnout subscales when one takes into consideration the
inconsistent findings of the previous research. Future studies should continue to examine
gender differences in coach burnout to better understand the impact the gender of the
coach has on burnout.
One also has to consider the sample size of collegiate swimming coaches obtained
for the present study as a possible explanation for the results. Because a smaller sample
of coaches was used for the analyses, a greater treatment effect would need to be present
in order for significant differences or relationships to surface. However, the sample of
coaches obtained was larger than those of previous studies examining the influence of
leadership behaviors on coach and athlete burnout (e.g. Price & Weiss, 2000; Vealey et
al., 1998).
It is also possible that coaches responded to the questionnaires in a socially
desirable manner in expressing their levels of burnout and style of decision-making. In
fact, previous research has masked the true nature of burnout questionnaires to account