United States Sports Academy - "America's Sports University"

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the participation motives and goal orientations of participants in the Hong Kong Master Games. The participants were 108 men and 52 women (N=160). The age range of participants was 35 to 77 years old (M= 46.2, SD = 9.2). They were divided into three age groups (30-39 years old, n=32; 40-49 years old, n=96; above 50 years old, n=32). The Participation Motivation Inventory (Gill, Gross & Huddleston, 1983), and the Task and Ego Orientations Questionnaire (Duda & Whitehead, 1998) were utilized. The top five participation motives were fun, affiliation/friendship, fitness, skill development and achievement/status. The participation motives and the goal orientations for men and women were similar. The oldest adults had significantly higher scores on the eight participation motives: fun, skill development, fitness, team atmosphere, achievement/ status, affiliation /friendship, energy release and miscellaneous than the younger and middle age adults. The mean score on task orientation was higher than the ego orientation for all participants. The empirical results of this Hong Kong study support earlier studies (Vogel, Brechat, Leprete, Kaltenbach, Berthal & Lonsdorfer, 2009) that strongly encourage physical activity leaders to design sport and physical activity programs for adults in order to enhance their physical, social, psychological and mental well being.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate preferred shopping behaviors of golfers in the state of Tennessee. While much research has been done on retail shopping behavior in general, little exists regarding shopping behavior in sport retail, and more specifically golf retail. While golfer behavior has been researched in other areas such as tourism, it has not been fully researched in the sport or retail literature. Since this segment of consumer spends millions of dollars per year, this study was conducted to fill the gap in the literature regarding this unique consumer. An online survey was distributed among a state-wide professional golf organization regarding preferred shopping and golf course attributes. Results showed a significant relationship between some variables, including brands/designers offered. This research will be helpful to golf retailers, golf merchandisers, golf marketers and managers, who sell, buy or deal with golf apparel and/or related merchandise to better tailor marketing and promotional activities and ultimately increase revenue. This paper is unique and applicable in the fact that golf has not been fully researched in the marketing or retail area.

Key words: golf, marketing, consumer behavior, retail

Introduction

Abstract

The aim of this study was to define which coordination abilities are the most important in tennis and to identify whether a coordination training program will improve the learning process of tennis skills (backhand and forehand). Fifteen expert coaches in tennis completed a check list of five coordination abilities and suggested that the most important coordination abilities for tennis players are “kinaesthetic differentiation” and “reaction time”. Based on the results from the questionnaires, the program designed to practice the two most important coordination abilities. Participants were 48 novice children (age 11 ± 2 years). They were randomly divided into two group, the experimental group (EG, n=24) and the control group (CG, n=24). Both groups followed tennis training program 3 times/wk for eight weeks. Participants of the experimental group performed a specific coordination program for 20 min before the skills practice and participants of control group performed the traditional practice. The tennis skill performance and learning assessed using observation technique in five basic elements of every skill. There were three measurements, pre, post and retention test, one week after post test without practice. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) with repeated measures (2 group X 3 measures) revealed that there was significant interaction between groups and measures. The Bonferroni post hoc analysis revealed that experimental group perform better than the control group in the post test and in the retention test in the two skills. The results of this study indicated that coordination training program help athletes to learn and perform the forehand and backhand tennis skills better.

Key words: Coordination abilities, kinaesthetic differentiation, reaction time, tennis skill