Whether your an Olympic athletic coach or the best football coach in the village and desire to progress, we must focus on mental health stability of those under you. Elite athletes are just as likely as non-athletes to experience anxiety or depression.
Thus, training coaches in mental health awareness and mental health literacy may then improve the emotional climate of the performance environment enhancing interactions and positive relationships between an athlete and a coach.
Sports participation, particularly through physical activity, has many benefits to health and well-being. Recent evidence suggests that competitive sport may contribute to poor mental health. These pressures combined with how athletes interpret their sports performance failures can be problematic. Coaches, who manage stress well, may be better equipped to prevent or deal with athletes’ stress more effectively.
Mental health awareness programs offer the opportunity to enhance help-seeking behaviours and improve well-being among athletes through counselling or psychological skills training which disseminate knowledge related to mental health conditions and treatment.
March 2015, the UK government presented a ‘mental health in sport’ initiative. Several sports associations, including the Rugby Football Union, UK Athletics, British Swimming, the England and Wales Cricket Board and the Football Association, signed a contract pledging to support the elimination of stigma, narrow-mindedness and prejudice surrounding mental health. This was a stride forward for the UK concerning the de-stigmatisation of mental health and an encouraging act toward facilitating help-seeking.
Within Northern Ireland, Sport Northern Ireland (SNI) has reviewed mental health awareness programs nationally in the development of a new strategy for those involved in sport . The European Federation of Sport Psychology is in the process of developing a position statement related to the mental health of elite athletes. whilst in Australia, elite athlete Brief Counselling Support programs have been put in place as well as mental health awareness programs for athletes.
Breslin, G., Shannon, S., Haughey, T. et al. A systematic review of interventions to increase awareness of mental health and well-being in athletes, coaches and officials. Syst Rev 6, 177 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13643-017-0568-6
