Sports Psychology: How to Improve Your Mental Game

In “ Sex and Sport, ” Troy Moles, Trent Petrie, and Edward Watkins Jr investigated the extent to which sports counselors are sexually attracted to their clients in the course of their practice. The article examines the extent of both sexual boundary crossing as well as non-sexual boundary crossing among sports counselors with their clients within the sports counseling profession. The researchers sampled 170 male and 110 female sports counseling consultants (Moles, Petrie, & Watkins, 2016). The methodology used for this study was a survey with the findings indicating that 112 sports professional counselors (SPC) among the participants had been attracted to at least one of their clients during the practice of their profession. Among the counselors who were sexually attracted to their clients, 13.6% of them had crossed the sexual boundaries with their clients mainly by discussing matters relating to sex. However, none of the sports counseling professionals reported having engaged in sexual intercourse or kissing their clients. The study further found that non-sexual boundary crossing was more rampant among the SPCs. 58% of them reported having initiated touching that they considered non-sexual with their clients. 32% among them attended parties with their clients while 89% attended client’s sporting events (Moles, Petrie, & Watkins, 2016). 

The findings of this research show the struggles that sports psychology consultants go through during their practice. As normal humans, psychologists are sexually attracted to their clients given that most of them have their bodies kept fit hence attractive. Some of the psychologists end up crossing the sexual boundaries through sexual conversations and caressing. This is a worrying trend among counselling professionals. It begs the question on the extent to which ethics and morality must be applied within the sporting counseling profession. Therefore, sports counselors should be assisted in handling their attraction to their clients as part of their training. 

Reference  

Moles, T. A., Petrie, T. A., & Watkins, C. E. (2016). Sex and sport: Attractions and boundary crossings between sport psychology consultants and their client-athletes. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 47 (2), 93-101.