Knowledge, Attitude and Coaching Style as Predictors of Doping Among Athletes of Oyo State Sports Council

Abstract

Despite the attention given and development of advanced drug testing systems, both deliberate and inadvertent doping in sports is increasing in elite, amateur and school sports. Although World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is doing a lot to dampen the practice, yet there is increase of the malaise. It is against this background that the study investigated knowledge, attitude and coaching style as predictors of doping among athletes of Oyo State Sports Council. Descriptive survey research design was used. The participants for this study were two hundred and twenty (220) athletes of Oyo State Sports Council randomly sampled from various sports. Self-structured questionnaire was used to measure doping knowledge; the Performance Enhancement Attitude Scale (PEAS), Controlling Coach Behaviour Scale (CCBS) and The Moral Disengagement in Doping Scale (MDDS) were administered on the respondents. Reliability values of the instruments were 0.80, 0.78, 0.85 and 0.84 respectively. The data were analysed using multiple regression to test the hypotheses. There was a significant joint contribution of independent variables on doping (F(3,216) =22.306; R=.486, R2=.237, Adjusted R2=.226, p<0.05). Two (2) out of three (3) independent variables had significant contributions (p><.05); attitude (β= -.343, t= -5.239) and coaching style (β= -.255, t= -4.030), knowledge (β=--.029, t=-.485, p>.05). However, knowledge had no significant contribution on doping. It was therefore recommended that strong anti-doping education programmes be given to sport coaches and encourage them to do their best to maintain the motivation of the athletes and remove an important determinant of cheating in sport.