An ideal introduction for trainees and practitioners looking to understand the what, the why, and the how of coaching research.

This is your student guide to research in the field of coaching. It answers your questions about doing research and explores the challenges and opportunities presented by different ways of doing research specifically in coaching. An ideal introduction for trainees and practitioners looking to understand the what, the why, and the how of coaching research.

This highly engaging guidebook provides an accessible introduction to research methods and the research process within the coaching and mentoring context. Starting with an introduction to the basic principles of research theory and practice, explaining why we need to do research at all, what it is, why it′s important, and moving on to cover the ins and outs of actually doing research, this book provides students with everything they need to know all in one place. Packed full of case studies, activities and hints and tips for best practice, this book throws a life belt to all coaching and mentoring trainees and practitioners looking to make the best start in their research career.

Research Methods in Sports Coaching is a key resource for any student, researcher or practitioner wishing to undertake research into sports coaching. It takes the reader through each phase of the research process, from identifying valuable research questions, to data collection and analyses, to the presentation and dissemination of research findings. It is the only book to focus on the particular challenges and techniques of sports coaching research, with each chapter including examples, cases and scenarios from the real world of sports coaching. The book introduces and explores important philosophical, theoretical and practical considerations in conducting coaching research, including contextual discussions about why it’s important to do sports coaching research, how to judge the quality of coaching research, and how sports coaching research might meet the needs of coaching practitioners. Written by a team of leading international scholars and researchers from the UK, US, Canada and Australia, and bridging the gap between theory and practice, this book is an essential course text for any research methods course taken as part of a degree programme in sports coaching or coach education.

"This ... guidebook provides an accessible introduction to research methods and the research process within the coaching and mentoring context. Starting with an introduction to the basic principles of research theory and practice, explaining why we need to do research at all, what it is, why it's important, and moving on to cover the ins and outs of actually doing research, this book provides students with everything they need to know all in one place. Packed full of case studies, activities and hints and tips for best practice, this book throws a life belt to all coaching and mentoring trainees and practitioners looking to make the best start in their research career."--Provided by publisher

This book raises critical questions about the explanatory framework guiding sports coaching research and presents a new conceptualization for research in the field. Through mapping and contextualizing sports coaching research within a corporatized higher education, the dominant or legitimate forms of sports coaching knowledge are problematized and a new vision of the field, which is socially and culturally responsive, communitarian and justice-oriented emerges.

How can coaches maximise the effectiveness of their practice? What can research tell us about how and why coaching ‘works’? How can we use the evidence base to enable others to reach their full potential? Coaching with Research in Mind brings together cutting-edge research in coaching and psychology, accessibly summarises the findings, and provides a clear and specific breakdown of what research tells us coaches and leaders should be doing and why. Rebecca J. Jones provides practitioners with the information and guidance they need to apply research in their practice, explaining how coaches can understand coachee characteristics, how they impact the coaching process and how coaches should adapt their practice to accommodate them. The book explains how to identify which principles of the coaching process influence effectiveness and tailor practice to maximise their impact. Jones also explores the impact of environmental factors and assesses how their influence can be limited. Coaching with Research in Mind will be essential reading for both new and experienced coaches looking to enhance the effectiveness and impact of their coaching, and for managers, leaders and L&D procurers who utilise coaching as a leadership style.

Research shapes our understanding of practice in powerful and important ways, in sports coaching as in any other discipline. This innovative study explores the philosophical foundations of sport coaching research, examining the often implicit links between research process and practice, descriptions and prescriptions. Arguing that the assumptions of traditional single-disciplinary accounts, such as those based in psychology or sociology, risk over-simplifying our understanding of coaching, this book presents an alternative framework for sports coaching research based on critical realism. The result is an embedded, relational and emergent conception of coaching practice that opens new ways of thinking about coaching knowledge. Drawing on new empirical case study research, it demonstrates vividly how a critical realist-informed approach can provide a more realistic and accountable knowledge to coaching stakeholders. This knowledge promises to have important implications for coaching, and coach education and development practices. Sport Coaching Research and Practice: Ontology, Interdisciplinarity and Critical Realism is fascinating reading for any student or researcher working in sports coaching, sport pedagogy, physical education, the philosophy or sociology of sport, or research methodology in sport and exercise.

An ideal companion to any core research methods text, The Methods Coach: Learning Through Practice helps students to bridge the gap between knowing and doing. The coaching program encourages students to not only understand research methods, but to do research methods for themselves. Labexercises are organized into three parts-a 'tune-up', applications, and constructive feedback-to optimize students' ability to apply the theories, concepts, and techniques found in introductory research methods courses. With this hands-on, lab-based approach, The Methods Coach offers far more thanconventional study guides.