Psychological capital, need for security, coping strategies of sports students in conditions of covid-19

Abstract

The pandemic COVID 19 has posed unprecedented ordeals before the field of sport and education in the last two years. The majority of the research in the field of sports psychology has been related to the psychological consequences from the pandemic. There have been few surveys connected with the psychological determinants of behavior and personal safety prevention. The aim of this study was to investigate the Psychological Capital, Need for Security and their relation to the preferred Coping Strategies during the pandemic COVID-19 among sports students from Bulgaria and to outline their specificity depending on gender, kind of sport, and level of qualification. The research was done among 106 sports students aged between 18 and 34 years. For the purposes of the research the participants were divided into groups according to their gender, kind of sport, and level of qualification. The research methods included: 1) Psychological Capital Questionnere (Luthans, Youssef, Avolio 2007); 2) Methods of Researching the Need for Security in Human Behaviour (Velichkov, Radoslavova, Vasileva, Todorov 1998); 3) Approach to Coping in Sport Questionnaire (ACSQ-1; Kim 1999; Kim & Duda 1997). There were significant differences depending on gender, and kind of sport. There were significant correlations between the components of psychological capital and the strategies: emotional calming, cognitive restructuring, and behavioral risk, between self-efficacy and need for security.