Paauglių sportinio tapatumo sąsajos su mokyklos baimės įveikos strategijomis

For approximately 30 years, researchers have been investigating the relationship between the feeling of identity and the involvement in sports, the need to be physically active and sports achievements. One of the concepts of the human identity is defined as athletic identity. Regular and health-positive physical activeness is impossible to detach from athletic identity which must be developed already in the period of adolescence. The manifestation of the athletic identity of adolescents is an important prerequisite when developing the physical education and lifelong health-favorable physical activeness among youngsters. Besides, it is likely that the physical maturation of personality is also interrelated with the emotional maturity of adolescents. 452 students aged 13 to 16 (age average 14.75 ± 1.11) participated in the research. The research involved 7 th to 9th grade students, of whom there were 241 females (53.3 %) and 209 males (46.2 %). The distribution in terms of age among the males (age average 14.79 ± 1.06) and females (age average 14.69 ± 1.15) (t, p = 0.431) and in terms of the grade of studies was not statistically significant (c2, p = 0.238). The employed Athletic Identity Questionnaire for Adolescents by Anderson et al. (2007) is based on the model of athletic identity as defined by C.B. Anderson (2004). In order to outline the strategies of adolescents seeking to overcome school-related fears, a differentiated descriptor of the fear of school (DBA) was employed together with a questionnaire on strategies of overcoming fears (ĮV) (Rost, Schermer, 2008). The research took place in the years 2013– 2014 in three public schools of general education located in Kaunas City, Lithuania in cooperation with teachers of physical education. The athletic identity of males is more prominently expressed than that of females. Females more commonly than males overcome the fear of school with productive work activity whereas males more frequently than females eliminate the fear of school by evading, cheating or getting relaxed. Males as well as females are equally inclined to fight the fear of school by suppressing the fear, distracting attention and diminishing the threat of the situation. Adolescents aged 13 to 16 with a more prominently expressed athletic identity commonly defeat the fear of school by acting productively or relaxing whereas adolescents aged 13 to 16 with a less prominently expressed athletic identity usually overcome the fear of school by cheating, evading or stifling their fears. In order to ensure high quality physical education of students – not only promoting physical activity ‘here and now’ but also developing athletic identity – it is important to consider the gender of adolescents and evaluate the importance which they assign to the social support of being physically active they receive. The results of the research allow one to claim that the development of athletic identity is significantly related with the strategies of overcoming the fear of school. Keywords: athletic identity, strategies of overcoming school-related fears, adolescents. DOI:  http://dx.doi.org/10.15823/sm.2016.2