Research Methods

What We Did

Through the use of an online survey, we collected information that measures the enjoyment of water polo athletes. We also looked at whether or not athletes received some type of athletic scholarship.

We measured the athletes enjoyment using a Physical Activity Enjoyment Scale (PACES; Kenzierski & DeCarlo, 1991) scale that contained questions like:

(Modified Version of Physical Enjoyment Scale)

In addition to these questions we also asked questions trying to discover the type of athletic scholarship an athlete receives.

Who We Asked

We wanted to know a little bit about the athletes we surveyed!

Age
Gender
Ethnicity
College Year (freshman, sophomore, junior, senior)

We surveyed 35 water polo athletes of California State University of Long Beach. The average range of the participants was 20.3 years of age. As seen in the graphs below, the sample consisted of 20 female and 15 male participants. Also, the majority of the participants were White/ Caucasian in race.

What We found

We concluded that extrinsic motivation in the form of scholarship does not impact the enjoyment of the sport.
A noteworthy findings that we discovered is that the enjoyment score for the male water polo participants were significantly higher than the female water polo participants despite the number females having a larger count.
- Gender differences in enjoyment should be looked into!

What does it all mean?

Getting some type of scholarship doesn't mean you'll necessarily start to dislike playing your sport. Enjoy the sport you play for whatever reason with all the benefits that it may or may not give you!
Although we found no difference, we should still keep in mind when our passions become job-like, there is an effect where we start to dislike activities that we 'have' to do.

Google Sites

Report abuse