Parents’ perspectives and young athletes’ perceptions of social support

The purpose of this study was to examine experiences of being elite tennis players’ parents, social support they provided to their children, and athletes’ perceptions of influences of their parents’ support. Four focus groups (2 athletes and 2 parents groups) were conducted to collect data from both athletes and parents. The data were analyzed by thematic analysis and resulted in nine higher order themes including initiation of sporting career, expectations, satisfaction, parents’ concerns, tangible, esteem, information, emotion, and network support. Later five themes which indicate kinds of support for athletes received from their parents were used to develop a matrix which can explain athletes’ perceptions for each support they received from their parents. The findings revealed that there were some gaps between providers’ and receivers’ perspectives in effectiveness of provided support because some kinds of support were not effective when the support was provided without considering athletes needs. Therefore, the findings highlighted that support could be much effective if support providers for athletes consider athletes needs before they provide certain support to those athletes.