Parental Psychological Control and Moral Attitudes in Sport

Introduction: An interesting aspect of parenting that could have a relevant role in predicting indices of morality in sport is psychological control. Psychologically controlling parents rely on intrusive and manipulative strategies such as guilt induction, disappointment, shaming, isolation, and love withdrawal. Recently were proposed two-domain specific expressions in psychologically controlling parenting. Dependency-oriented psychological control is characteristic of parents who pressure their sons and daughters to keep them within close physical and emotional relatedness. Achievement-oriented psychological control is characteristic of parents who are highly demanding and pressure to excel in performance relevant contexts (e.g. sports). For this reason this study will examine the role of these specific domains of psychological control in prediction attitudes towards moral decision making in sport (Acceptance of cheating, Acceptance of gamesmanship). Method: 270 team sport athletes (137 male and 133 female) ranged in age from 17 to 25 (M = 20.93, SD = 1.90) have completed the Dependency-Oriented and Achievement-Oriented Psychological Control Scale (DAPCS) and the Attitudes to Moral Decision-making in Youth Sport Questionnaire (AMDYSQ). DAPCS assesses two modalities of self-perception of parental psychological control: dependency-oriented and achievement-oriented. The AMDYSQ assess the acceptance of cheating, and of gamesmanship. Results: In females, regression analyses showed that after controlling for age and exercise the model with the paternal psychological control had a significant increase in R2 [F change (2, 128) = 5.072; p = .008; R2 = .073] with the paternal dependency-oriented psychological control providing an additional unique contribution (β = .307; t = 3.082; p = .003) predicting acceptance of cheating. In males, instead, there was a significant increase in R2 after entering the two domains of maternal psychological control [F change (2, 132) = 4.771; p = .010; R2 = .066] with the achievement-oriented psychological control giving a strong contribution (β = .215; t = 2.281; p = .024) in predicting acceptance of gamesmanship. Conclusion: Results emphasize the two-domain’s role in the development of the moral attitudes in sport. The paternal dependency-oriented for female and the maternal achievement-oriented for male seem to create a more likely to violate the spirit or the rules of the game. The feeling of pressure that athletes percept by their parents, in fact, could promote the need to achieve at all costs and facilitate the acceptance of gamesmanship and cheating. This relationship could be better understood within the Self-Determination Theory to evaluate the role of psychological basic needs with young athletes.