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Differences regarding the psychological skill levels of soccer, basketball, rugby union and American football players in different playing positions have been reported. These differences are believed to be the result of the specific demands of each playing position. This study examined possible positional differences in a group of 185 South African provincial netball players (mean age: 20.7 years, S.D.: 3.87 years). The subjects were divided into seven playing positions, namely: goal shooter (n=21), goal attack (n=27), wing attack (n=35), centre (n=29), wing defence (n=24), goal defence (n=25) and goal keeper (n=24), and were compared with regard to seven psychological skills and a derived composite psychological skills score, measured by means of the Athletic Coping Skills Inventory (ACSI-28) of Smith et al. (1995). Effect sizes (expressed as Cohen's d-value) were used to indicate practical significant differences. Thirty-nine of the 168 positional comparisons yielded moderate practical significant differences (d≈0.5). Collectively, these results showed that the goal attack and wing defence players consistently outperformed the other positional groups, while the goal shooters showed the lowest psychological skill levels. The results are discussed with reference to their implications for psychological skills training programmes.

Research into the 'dual careers' (simultaneous academic and sport endeavours) of student-athletes is growing. There is a need to optimise student-athletes' transition from high school to tertiary institutions. The aim of this study was, first, to determine the personal, academic, and sporting needs of student rugby players, and, second, to evaluate the effectiveness of a purposefully developed experiential-learning programme on the coping self-efficacy and psychological wellbeing of first-year university rugby players. Players were evaluated prior to and 1 month after the intervention. The experiential-learning programme group showed significant improvements in all the measured variables, whereas the non-experiential-learning programme control group's scores remained unchanged. When corrected for the pre-test differences, the experiential-learning programme group outperformed the non-experiential-learning programme group in terms of problem-focussed coping, dealing with negative emotions and thoughts, obtaining support from family and friends, as well as overall happiness. The experiential-learning programme contributed to facilitating coping self-efficacy and psychological well-being of student rugby players.

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A sample of 41 male student rugby players (mean age: 21.87 ± 1.39 years) completed the Recovery-Stress Questionnaire (Kellmann & Kallus, 2001), Athlete Burnout Questionnaire (Raedeke & Smith, 2001) and Stellenbosch Mood Scale (Terry et al., 2003)