Background: Although athletes’ experiences of autonomy, competence, and relatedness play in key role in their motivation, performance-related outcomes, and wellness, there is no evidence to date on measures of autonomy, competence, and relatedness in the Romanian sport context. Building upon self-determination theory, the objective of this research was to adapt the Need Satisfaction and Frustration Scale and analyze its psychometric properties in the Romanian sport context. Methods: The participants were 642 professional athletes (354 males and 288 females; M_age = 22.81, SD = 5.78) who competed at the international and/or national level. Results: The results from confirmatory factor analyses psychometrically supported a six-factor correlated model, which was invariant across gender, age, and sport. Convergent validity was met by average variance extracted values between 0.60 and 0.74. Discriminant validity was underpinned by values from −0.72 to 0.72 for a heterotrait–monotrait ratio of correlations among the six factors. Reliability was endorsed by Cronbach’s alpha scores between 0.75 and 0.89, and between 0.76 and 0.89 for Raykov’s composite reliability coefficient. Criterion validity was supported by positive relationships of autonomy, competence, and relatedness satisfaction to autonomous motivation, and positive associations of autonomy, competence, and relatedness frustration with controlled motivation and amotivation. Conclusions: The Need Satisfaction and Frustration Scale is shown to be a valid and reliable measure of need satisfaction and frustration in professional Romanian athletes.

Previous studies on handball players’ performance are focused more on influence of physical, physiological factors and tactical strategies and less on the influence of cognitive, metacognitive and attentional regulation strategies. Performance can be achieved by attentional and emotional regulation alongside cognitive, metacognitive and procedural regulation strategies. This study explores the association between self-regulation strategies, mindfulness practice and performance. The sample consists of 288 Romanian handball players. The participants were 30% male and 70% female, with age between 12.01 and 14 years old, divided in three categories. The quantitative research design is descriptive and transversal. The method was survey based on questionnaires. There were interesting results found in different age categories and different performance levels. The variables (state mindfulness of body, self-monitoring, and self-efficacy) explained 87% of the variance in sports performance, in a hierarchical multiple regression. The research findings indicated that handball players with a high level of acceptance of one’s own thoughts and emotions, non-judging present-moment awareness, conscious monitoring the execution of movements, and confidence in their abilities to succeed could have more chances to achieve the desired performance.

Values and Interferences of Psychomotricity in Education – a Study of the Domain-Specific Literature

Objective: This study aims to examine the relationships between social support, physical literacy, and healthy lifestyle beliefs in adolescents and to investigate the moderating effect of enjoyment of physical activities on these relationships.Method: The study was conducted with the participation of 1,349 adolescents. The ages of the participants ranged between 10 and 14 years, and 49.6% were male (n = 669) and 50.4% were female (n = 680). Data were collected using the Healthy Lifestyle Belief Scale for Adolescents to measure adolescents' healthy lifestyle beliefs, the Perceived Physical Literacy Scale for Adolescents (PPLSA) to determine their physical literacy levels, the Social Support Scale in Physical Activities to assess the perception of social support, and the Enjoyment of Physical Activity Scale to measure the level of enjoyment of physical activities. The study tested the moderated mediation model for its association among the variables.Results: The model developed in this study found social support in PA predicted health lifestyle beliefs, positively, and significantly. Social support and perceptions of a healthy lifestyle are moderated by physical literacy, research shows. A further analysis also found that the relationship between physical literacy and social support is moderated by enjoyment of physical activities. However, the association between social support and healthy lifestyle beliefs and between physical literacy and healthy lifestyle beliefs were not appreciably influenced by enjoyment in physical activity. The findings indicated that social support has a positive and significant effect on physical literacy and attitudes toward healthy lifestyle. Physical literacy was identified as a central contributor to improving adolescents' health habits by mediating the relationship between social support and conceptions of healthy living. However, the enjoyment of fitness did not matter in some situations, the study found. These results further illustrate the importance of promoting social support and physical literacy instruction to promote a wellness lifestyle adoption by adolescents. The possible long-term effects of feeling good about exercising in various settings, and for health-related habits, should receive more scrutiny.

Background: Lately, there has been a change in the approach to physical education as a school subject. The new (knowledge-based) approach proposes the teaching of a theoretical component that provides information and complements the practical one. The students thus acquire a thorough understanding of the principles underlying physical activity and assimilate the knowledge needed to independently conduct their physical activity throughout their lives. Materials & Methods: Firstly, there were identified a number of interventions that implement the theoretical component specific to the new approach, in the school environment. Interventions targeting students from the first grade to the university level were taken into account, without setting any geographical or temporary limits. Then, we analyzed the way in which the theoretical content was adapted and implemented at each educational level. The tools used in the evaluation of the theoretical component were also presented. Results and Conclusion: Even from the elementary school level, we find adapted methods for implementing a cognitive component. As we advance through middle school, high school and university level, we find interventions that propose theoretical contents adapted to contemporary society. Within the university-level chapter, special attention was dedicated to future physical education teachers and to the way in which they are prepared to teach a cognitive component within the physical education lesson. Finally, three categories of tools used in the evaluation of the cognitive component were presented: questionnaires, interviews, interactive methods.