Athlete satisfaction at Universities in Gauteng

Abstract

One of the most frequently studied sectors of sport management is university sport which, in the South African context, includes the overall experiences of student athletes of higher education institutions in relation to the sport department/ bureau, their personnel, activity programmes and offerings. In countries outside South Africa the issue of athlete satisfaction has been studied from several research perspectives such as coach behaviour, athletic trainer and medical cover, leadership behaviour, role ambiguity, holistic university experience and stakeholder satisfaction with selected goals and processes. One of the conclusions reached was that critical to athlete satisfaction was the sport department's emphasis on student development over the performance of the sport department. The purpose of this study was to determine what contributed to the satisfaction of athletes at universities in South Africa. The participants in this study consisted of 400 student-athletes at universities in the Gauteng province of South Africa. The instrument that was used in the study was a validated athlete satisfaction questionnaire (ASQ) developed by Riemer and Chelladurai (1998). The present study has identified support, individual performance, personal treatment by the coach, team task contribution and strategy as important indicators of athlete satisfaction. The findings of the study have important implications for universities as a whole as it can influence the reputation and image of the institution, the financial and other resources being made available for the institution, the number of quality athletes that can be attracted to the institution and the culture of the institution.

South African Journal for Research in Sport, Physical Education and Recreation Vol. 28(2) 2006: 121-131