The aim of the study was to examine how players’ perceptions of sociocultural factors and intra- and interpersonal aspects of sporting experiences may have influenced the emotions, cognitions, and behaviours of elite female soccer players prior to the occurrence of ACL injuries. The research questions guiding the study were: (a) how did female elite soccer players perceive that their psychosocial experiences were related to their cognitive, physiological, and emotional states prior to their ACL injuries, and (b) how did the players feel their perceived states influenced their behaviours prior to injury occurrence. The participants consisted of the total population of female players (N = 18) competing in the Swedish women’s elite league, who incurred a total ACL tear during the 2012 season. Using a semi-structured interview guide, all players were interviewed post-season. We represented the data using a storytelling approach of aggregated creative nonfiction. The aggregated stories showed sociocultural rules and expectations of overtraining and placing pressure on athletes to play even if they were not physically or psychologically fit. Responding to pressures with potentially risk-increasing behaviours might raise the probability of becoming injured through a number of pathways. Team managers, coaches, and members of the medical team are recommended to develop environments that stimulate the players to engage in adaptive stress-recovery and risk-decreasing behaviours.

Within the field of applied sport psychology, there is an increasing appreciation for diversity of training models, research methodologies, and therapeutic approaches. For example, psychodynamic formulations and interpretations have begun to appear more frequently in the sport psychology literature. In keeping with emerging psychodynamic viewpoints, we believe the time is right to introduce a qualitative sport-specific projective instrument: the Athlete Apperception Technique (AAT). The AAT represents a new technique based on psychodynamic theory and established projective test construction principles. It was designed primarily as a clinical tool for practitioners and not as an instrument for quantitative research into personality. It does, however, have potential research applications, especially in clinical sport case study research and narrative analysis investigations. The AAT produces an idiographic understanding of athletes’ characteristics, anxieties, and motivations (both conscious and unconscious). We briefly review the literature on the development of projective techniques, explain the rationale underlying the development of the AAT, and present three sequential studies to explain the AAT image selection procedures that led to the final product. © 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Background: Several studies have suggested that psy- chosocial variables can increase the risk of becoming injured during sport participation.

Objectives: The main objectives of these meta-analyses were to examine (i) the effect sizes of relationships between the psychosocial variables (suggested as injury predictors in the model of stress and athletic injury) and injury rates, and (ii) the effects of psychological interven- tions aimed at reducing injury occurrence (prevention).

Methods: Electronic databases as well as specific sport and exercise psychology journals were searched. The literature review resulted in 48 published studies containing 161 effect sizes for injury prediction and seven effect sizes for injury prevention.

Results: The results showed that stress responses (r = 0.27, 80 % CI [0.20, 0.33]) and history of stressors (r = 0.13, 80 % CI [0.11, 0.15]) had the strongest associations with injury rates. Also, the results from the path analysis showed that the stress response mediated the relationship between history of stressors and injury rates. For injury prevention studies, all studies included (N = 7) showed decreased injury rates in the treatment groups compared to control groups.

Conclusion: The results support the model’s suggestion that psychosocial variables, as well as psychologically, based interventions, can influence injury risk among athletes. © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016