Purpose in Life of Elite Athletes after Spinal Cord Injury
Open Access
- 23 May 2021
- journal article
- research article
- Published by MDPI AG in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
- Vol. 18 (11), 5563
- https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18115563
Abstract
Background: Searching for the meaning of human existence is man’s fundamental orientation. People are free to find meaning in their lives, and while they are not always free to choose the conditions of life, they are free to choose their attitude toward the conditions in which they find themselves. When people experience an unchangeable situation, the most important thing is the attitude they take toward it. This study aimed to identify the sense of meaning in life among elite athletes after a spinal cord injury (SCI) and to analyze the different aspects contributing to this domain. Methods: The study involved five athletes with at least national-level achievements in sports prior to a SCI. The study consisted of an interview using a communicator and filling out two online questionnaires—a personal questionnaire and the Purpose in Life Scale. Results: Analyzing the quantitative results, four participants achieved results indicating a high sense of meaning in life, while one participant achieved a significantly lower result. Conclusions: What affects one’s purpose in life is not so much the objective physical limitation but how much physicality one perceives to have lost as a result of the injury. Elite athletes stay involved in the sporting environment, which prevents the loss of purpose and maintains a sense of meaning at a high level. Both telling the story of your own illness and listening to the stories of others help the process of self-healing.Keywords
This publication has 35 references indexed in Scilit:
- ‘Unsatisfactory Saturation’: a critical exploration of the notion of saturated sample sizes in qualitative researchQualitative Research, 2012
- Psychological resources in spinal cord injury: a systematic literature reviewSpinal Cord, 2011
- A longitudinal study of depression in survivors of spinal cord injurySpinal Cord, 2011
- Meaning‐centered group psychotherapy for patients with advanced cancer: a pilot randomized controlled trialPsycho‐Oncology, 2009
- Post‐traumatic growth and life threatening physical illness: A systematic review of the qualitative literatureBritish Journal of Health Psychology, 2009
- When narratives matter: men, sport, and spinal cord injury: Table 1Medical Humanities, 2005
- Men, sport, spinal cord injury, and narratives of hopeSocial Science & Medicine, 2005
- Purpose in life as a mediator of adjustment after spinal cord injury.Rehabilitation Psychology, 2003
- Sport, Spinal Cord Injury, Embodied Masculinities, and the Dilemmas of Narrative IdentityMen and Masculinities, 2002
- On the relation between meaning in life and psychological well‐beingBritish Journal of Psychology, 1992