MEASURING RESILIENCE IN ATHLETES WITH PHYSICAL DISABILITIES

INTRODUCTION Recent study displayed significantly lower mean resilience of athletes with a physical disability than those reported in other studies with the general population(1). This study aimed to analyze whether there are differences or/and similarities between wheelchair tennis players (WTP) and able-bodied tennis players (TP) and to investigate about the characteristics of resilience. METHODS 80 participants: 39 WTP and 41 TP. Several tools have been used: a personal data collection form and 6 self-report questionnaires (1: Italian Adaptation of Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, CD-RISC; 2: Trait Sport-Confidence Inventory, TSCI; 3: Italian Adaptation of the General Self-Efficacy Scale, GSE; 4: Emotion Regulation Questionnaire, ERQ; 5: Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, MSPSS; 6: Inventory of Stressful and Traumatic Life Events, STLE). The data collected were analyzed using the SPSS 16 statistics program. RESULTS The analysis of CD-RISCs showed: 18% of WTP had a level of resilience beneath 30 compared to 46% of TP; 82% of WTP had a good/excellent ability to manage stress compared to 54% of TP. Through the analysis of TSCIs, no significant differences of confidence emerged between WTP and TP. GSEs showed: 78% of WTP had a self-efficacy of more than 30 compared to 64% of able-bodied players. The analysis of ERQs showed that TP controlled emotions slightly better than WTP and that WTP suppressed emotions more than TP. MSPSSs showed that TP perceived social support slightly higher than WTP. Through the analysis of STLEs, it was noted that 15% of WTP had suffered a high level of traumatic events during the life compared to 8% of TP. CONCLUSION The majority of WTP of this study have a higher level of resilience than the majority of TP. The most significant result concerns the self- efficacy which was higher in WTP. Further research is needed to study any correlations between the different aspects of resilience. The strength of this study is its innovative way of analyzing the resilience through different questionnaires. REFERENCES 1. Cardoso FL, Sacomori C. Resilience of athletes with physical disabilities: a cross-sectional study. Revista de Psicologia del deporte. 2014; 23: 15–22.