Sports can have a huge influence on all of us, whether you are a bystander or fan, but sports have a huge influence on the athlete. Over forty million youth participate in sports up to the age of eighteen. Most athletes are affected by his/her performance each and every day by practicing or competing. It may not be a surprise that an athlete’s performance is affected by his/her self-esteem and that girls often are more sensitive than boys to criticism, however it may be a surprise that coaching techniques can tremendously affect the female athlete’s self-esteem.

There is likely a time in each athlete’s life where he/she felt neglected or mistreated by his/her coach. It was shown in a 1997 study by Smith and Smoll, that coaches cannot recognize his/her own negative behaviors, much less how it affects the players. What makes a negative behavior are things like poor teaching habits, showing uncaring behavior, being unfair, and inhibiting mental skills {Gearity and Murray, 2006}. For me as an athlete, I have had my bad days. Most of the time, my coach seems to only pay attention to his star athlete, ignoring me and the other girls. He is a great coach but he gives the impression that he has given up on me so I should just give up and not participate anymore. This brings my self-esteem lower and I feel like I’m not an athlete, and I have no ability to improve or ever be good. When I asked girl athletes about their coach, the girls said that they feel like their coaches only focus on their star players. This raises the question of if the coach only focuses on his/her star players how do the coaches know if he/she have helped each player reach his/her full potential and maybe even create unexpected stars? In another study in 2003, by Cote and Sedgwich, and in2006 by Cumming, Smith, and Smoll, it was recognized that coaching behavior is
pivotal to create a positive sport environment. Some coaches say that they yell and do not “get into the game” and maybe even say that they equally focus on all their athletes but that is all false. Lets face it if you are a coach, than you care for the sport, and everyone gets involved in games and yells. On the topic of the coach focusing on his/ her star athletes, it is like that kid who sucks up to the teacher in class, also known as the teacher pet, the teacher is going to pay more attention to that student due to the “sucking up” so is it not reasonable a coach will do that too? I’m not saying that the star athlete “sucks up” but I am comparing the teacher to the coach and how he/she pays more attention to those kids who are better than the others. I’m not saying the other athletes do not try because we all try to do our hardest and best but our coaches do not always see that and expect us to do better or go harder when we are at our breaking points. Which leads to lower self-esteems and a drop out rate in sports, even a dislike for coaches.

One cannot dismiss the fact that yes, an athlete’s performance affects his/her self-esteem but saying that a coach’s coaching techniques, which are to create success for the athlete and team, and to bring each athlete to his/her potential or even better, are part of the athletes self-esteem issue may seem ridiculous. The coach is just there to teach you the basic techniques of the sport. The coaches are not there to help boost self-esteem with your performance, that is your job. Self-esteem is the regard you hold for yourself {Cohn, Self Esteem in the Athlete}. An athlete should keep his/her head in the game, he or she are to keep themselves physically and mentally strong for his/her sport there is no way that the coach can help with those efforts. You are you. Yourcoach is not you. In 2002, it was said by Marcotte, Fortin, Potvin, and Papillion that,
“Girls have lower self-esteem than boys.” It is true that a girl is more sensitive than boys but that does not play a role in what someone does in a sport. If a girl takes something too personal in a sport than that is her fault. If or when a person plays a sport professionally, he/she cannot take something that is aimed at them too personally because that makes him/her weak in the eyes of the opponent and creates a negative outlook for him/her. You are you, you can only affect your own self-esteem a coach does not make it higher or lower, he/she are only there to coach, not someones therapist for playing issues.

To put it differently, an athlete is responsible for his/her self-esteem and how he/ she take criticism but a coach is supposed to bring each athlete to success not bring an athlete down with his/her critical remarks and offensive words. In 2012, it was said in the article How Bully Coaches Affects Athletes, “When athletes are being bullied, and singled out by coaches they begin to have doubts about their ability to perform which cause them to question their role in sports.” This shows that yes a coach does affect an athletes self-esteem. A coach can do this by always criticizing, ignoring, negative vibes, or like the quote said singling out an athlete. But it seems that girls are more known for being sensitive to their coaches actions. In a 1998 study, a group of girls from Montana between middle school and high school were asked about their favorite and least favorite coaches. About 183 girls said their favorite coaches were “fun, nice, listened to and understood players, fair, encouraging to individuals, knowledgeable, and pushed the team to do their best.” About 153 girls described their least favorite coach as “mean- rude, unfair, not encouraging, having yelled at players, having poor coaching skills,negative, and too strict.” {this study was done by Craig Stewart and Joan Taylor}. To
start off with the least favorite coaches it appears the most common thing about the coaches was his/her negative behavior. Having a negative out look can lead to many problems with an individual, if a coach is negative to his/her athlete and insult or criticize the athlete what is going to happen? The athlete is going to believe the coach and before a game or meet the athlete will think “Okay, don’t do this or that. Don’t mess up, coach is watching. Don’t make him/her mad.” which is not the picture the athlete wants in his/her head right before the game and leads the athlete to perform the way him/her did not want to perform. So, instead of being a negative coach and disrespecting your athletes take a more positive side to a situation so an athlete before his/her game can picture mentally how he/she want to perform not how he/she do not want to perform.

Sports are all about being physically strong, but it also requires being mentally strong. In the mental part of an athletes brain, there is self-esteem, confidence, and visualization of being successful. And in the self-esteem part of the brain, one’s coach can have an affect on it. Wouldn’t you want a coach who was positive, encouraging, and easy to talk too, and someone who will take you far in the sport not someone who yells constantly, criticizes, and is disrespectful to you?