Competence support in physical education: a predictor towards a more self-determined physical activity behavior?

Objectives: Given a widespread continuous decrease in children’s and adolescents’ physical activity (PA), the potential of physical education (PE) in promoting young people’s PA motivation and behavior has become a key issue. Research in line with the trans-contextual model highlights the support of perceived autonomy in PE as a significant predictor for self-determined PA behavior in a leisure-time (LT) context (Hagger et al., 2003). However, the impact of competence and relatedness support still remains unclear. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the role of support during PE, differentiated into three basic needs for behavioral regulation in PE and LT. It was expected that, in addition to perceived autonomy, competence and relatedness would be relevant predictors.
Method: 244 students (139 girls) from Luxembourg, ranging from 11 to 21 years, participated in the study. Via a digital questionnaire, the scales need support (perceived autonomy, competence and relatedness; Standage, Duda, & Ntoumanis, 2005), basic needs (BPNES; Vlachopoulos, Ntoumanis, & Smith, 2010), and external and intrinsic motivation in PE (PLOC-R; Vlachopoulos et al., 2011) as well as in LT (BREQ-II; Markland & Tobin, 2004) were applied in the classroom. With regard to the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1985), the attitudes, perceived behavioral control, and intentions toward PA were assessed (Hagger et al., 2003).
Results: A SEM analysis showed that competence support in PE was the major predictor for self-determined behavior in PE, while perceived autonomy produced mixed findings. Relatedness support had a negative effect on external regulated behavior in PE. In accordance with the assumptions of the trans-contextual model, similar behavioral regulations in PE and LT were found. Furthermore, a more self-determined behavior in LT predicted higher attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control towards PA, which increased the intention of doing sports.
Discussion: Results suggest that the children’s perceived support of competence from the teacher during PE is an important factor to increase self-determined PA behavior. Further intervention programs may focus on improving the perception of competence during PE in order to increase motivation. In addition, these findings underline the importance for future research to consider the different roles of perceived support of competence, autonomy and relatedness in PE.