Motivation – what drives athletes to succeed?

For a coach to understand individual athletes and a squad, and to bring out the best in them, knowing exactly what motivates each person is essential. In “Motivation: What Moves Us?”, Daniel Goleman offers a useful way of thinking about it: motivation shares a Latin root – motere, “to move” – with the word emotion, and motives both set the goals and supply the energy to reach them. Anything that motivates tends to feel good; as one scientist put it, nature gets what it needs by making the necessary pleasurable.

Most elite athletes have a natural gift for their sport. The harder question is what pushes them to give everything for success. This week’s blog looks at self-determination theory and the different types of motivation that drive each individual.

Self-determination theory

There are two broad types of motivation – extrinsic and intrinsic. They are often presented as separate modes of behaviour, but in practice they rarely separate so cleanly, and what a person does usually comes from several motivations at once. It is more helpful to picture motivation as a continuous spectrum running from self-determined behaviour (done for enjoyment and satisfaction) to non-self-determined behaviour (done out of duty or necessity rather than desire). Sometimes doing something under pressure leads, in time, to the motivation to do it for pleasure. Everyday behaviour is never purely intrinsic or purely extrinsic – it mixes the two. What is clear, though, is that a sense of control over one’s own life and stronger intrinsic motivation help keep engagement and passion alive.

Self-determination theory (SDT) describes the capacity, or process, of choosing for oneself and steering one’s own life. It was brought to prominence by researchers Edward L. Deci and Richard M. Ryan across the 1970s and 1980s. At its heart is the idea that every person has three innate psychological needs:

1. Competence: achievement, knowledge and skill.
2. Autonomy: doing things one’s own way.
3. Relatedness: feeling connected to others.

The more fully each of these needs is met within an activity, the more intrinsic – and therefore the more enjoyable – it feels.

Types of motivation

Along the self-determination spectrum, motivation stretches from amotivation to intrinsic motivation, with these types in between:

• Amotivation: the action is unintentional or forced, with no sense of control and a feeling of just going through the motions.
• Extrinsic – external regulation: the action is done for a reward or out of fear of punishment for not doing it.
• Extrinsic – introjection: ego and approval are the drivers, with participation aimed at avoiding guilt or failure, or at propping up self-worth.
• Extrinsic – identification: the action carries clear meaning, and its personal importance is understood.
• Extrinsic – integration: the task is felt as one’s own, as part of the identity.
• Intrinsic: the action is done for the joy it brings.

To simplify with examples: an intrinsically motivated athlete trains because the playing, the skill-building and the competing are enjoyable, and because the sport fits closely with how they want to live. These athletes tend to be goal-focused and set on progress and development. An extrinsically motivated athlete trains for trophies, wins, media attention, or out of a fear of letting others down and being branded a failure.

Plenty of successful athletes are extrinsically motivated, and there is no right or wrong here. Still, building intrinsic motivation brings a greater sense of control and meaning, and sharpens results.

The link between motivation and athlete burnout

Given the pressure and demands of competitive sport, the growing interest in athlete burnout is no surprise. The role motivation plays in it has been studied directly. Through the lens of self-determination theory, burnout is tied to the chronic non-satisfaction of psychological needs – competence, autonomy and relatedness. Numerous studies have found that intrinsic motivation is negatively associated with athlete burnout, while amotivation is positively associated with its symptoms.

In “Motivational profiles and burnout in elite athletes: A person-centered approach”, the authors set out to examine how those profiles related to burnout. The study suggested that certain combinations of motivational regulation can leave athletes more (or less) vulnerable to burnout: those with relatively high amotivation and moderately controlled motivation showed a sharper drop in their sense of accomplishment and a greater devaluation of their sport. The findings point to a real need for effective strategies with strongly amotivated athletes, to lower the chance of burnout symptoms taking hold.

How to build intrinsic motivation in athletes

A coach’s behaviour towards athletes and the team can shape athlete satisfaction and motivation deeply. Research underlines that both motivation and results can rise when coaches tune their own behaviour to athletes’ needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness. Several approaches help:

• Focus on improving results. Athletes constantly measure themselves against others, which often leads to demotivation. It works better to encourage comparison against personal past performance and to mark the progress made.
• Ask the right questions. What actually drives an athlete to turn up, compete and work hard? Duty, pressure from parents, ego – or genuine love of the sport? On the way to success, athletes sometimes pass through self-doubt and lose motivation, dwelling on the negatives and forgetting why the sport appealed in the first place. Understanding how an athlete feels is half the battle, and watching how they respond to a coach’s words and actions reveals a great deal about the nature of their motivation.
• Coach positively. A positive, supportive approach matters. Criticism lands more easily when strengths are acknowledged and the criticism itself is constructive and framed positively. Helping athletes see their own progress, with positive feedback adapted to individual needs, feeds intrinsic motivation. Cote and Hedgwick (2003) argued that athletes’ self-esteem was raised by coaches who showed high levels of technical instruction, support and approval.
• Share control. Athletes respond better when they feel they have some say over, or influence on, the training environment. A coach can still set the overall shape of a session while giving athletes a voice in what they do, what is working and what could be better.
• Build connection. In team sport, how each person behaves within the group strongly affects results and team spirit. When the relationships within a team are strong, intrinsic motivation climbs. Encouraging shared activities beyond the sport helps deepen that sense of relatedness.
• Mindfulness and recovery. All work and no rest leaves an athlete badly burned out. Recognising the value of a balance between work and life matters – it means making time to socialise, do something relaxing and switch off from negative thoughts and sources of stress.
• Goals and targets. Achievable goals give athletes a bearing and highlight the small wins that add up to major progress over time. Athletes need to be involved in the process and to feel they have a voice and a degree of control.

Motivation is a big part of the “secret of success” in sport and in life. Everyone has off days. The most successful athletes are not always the strongest or fastest – often they are just the best at staying motivated.

About Metrifit

Metrifit fosters honest conversation and education around sleep, stress, nutrition and other key factors that can prove invaluable for coaches and athletes alike. In modern sport, the gap between winning and losing can come down to fractions of a second, millimetres or one last drop of energy, which makes data on every aspect of an athlete’s preparation genuinely valuable. When a coach tracks how an athlete responds to load, how they sleep and eat, and what their mood and stress levels are, those insights can inform decisions that deliver the needed edge. Metrifit’s new Lifestyle Profiling Survey helps assess the lifestyle factors affecting a team and motivate athletes to develop.