University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 5-2016 Development of the Running Identity Scale Matthew Philip Bejar University of Tennessee - Knoxville, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss Part of the Sports Sciences Commons, and the Sports Studies Commons Recommended Citation Bejar, Matthew Philip, "Development of the Running Identity Scale. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2016. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/3679 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Matthew Philip Bejar entitled "Development of the Running Identity Scale." I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with a major in Kinesiology and Sport Studies. Leslee A. Fisher, Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: Lars Dzikus, Jennifer Ann Morrow, Rebecca A. Zakrajsek Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) Development of the Running Identity Scale A Dissertation Presented for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Matthew Philip Bejar May 2016 ii Copyright © 2016 by Matthew Bejar All rights reserved. iii Acknowledgements There are many individuals whom I would like to thank for getting me to this point in my academic career. Thank you to Dr. Leslee Fisher for taking a chance on me and mentoring me over the past three years. I always appreciated that you were caring, yet always challenging me to be better. In regard to the cultural sport psychology movement, you kept me centered by frequently encouraging me to remember my moral and ethical commitments. Although the time has flown by, when I look back, it is amazing to think about how much I have grown as a person and a scholar. Thank you for unwavering belief in me even when there were times I did not believe in myself. I have been blessed to have you in my corner! Thank you to Dr. Rebecca Zakrajsek for serving on my committee and supervising my consulting hours. Whether it was research-, consulting-, class-, or job-related, every time I met with you, I left feeling energized and excited for potential opportunities. Because of you, I have a much firmer understanding of how to put sport psychology knowledge into practice. Thank you to Dr. Jennifer Ann Morrow for serving on my committee and providing amazing feedback on this project. Entering my PhD program, one of my goals was to enhance the depth and breadth of my knowledge pertaining to quantitative research methods, and I feel I have accomplished this. Because of you, I feel like I have been set up well for success as a future scholar and teacher. Thank you to Dr. Lars Dzikus for serving on my committee and providing valuable feedback on this project and other related studies pertaining to the sociocultural aspects of running. The amount of care and investment that you exhibit for students is admirable and is something that I strive to emulate as a future professor. iv Thank you to the nine expert reviewers who participated in the four-step Delphi process in this study. You all were amazingly generous with your time, particularly with a short turnaround time for each round. By providing invaluable feedback, you added an extra layer of rigor to this study and ultimately helped create a fine scale that will hopefully be used with runners. I am truly indebted to you all. Likewise, thank you to the former collegiate runners who provided feedback during the pretest phase of the scale development. Each of you made a valuable contribution to the scale and/or provided great ideas for future research on running identity. Thank you to Leslie Larsen and Joe Raabe for providing feedback on this project, but even more so for the memories that were created over the past three years. I would not have chosen anyone else to be in my cohort. Finally, thank you to my mother, father, brother, sister, and grandparents for supporting me over the last 28+ years of my life. Through the highs and the lows, you always believed in me and encouraged me to aim high. You all make me a better person, and your unconditional love is something that cannot be repaid. I love you. v Abstract The construct of running identity has been explored in both the sport psychology (e.g., Busanich, McGannon, & Schinke, 2012) and sport sociology literature (e.g., Allen-Collinson & Hockey, 2007). In comparison to other athletes, runners are typically more susceptible to exercise addiction (Coen & Ogles, 1993; Sachs, 1981), eating disorders (Wheeler, Wall, Belcastro, Conger, & Cumming, 1986), and preoccupation with leanness (Allen-Collinson & Hockey, 2007; Busanich et al., 2015). While instruments such as the Athletic Identity Measurement Scale (AIMS; Brewer, Van Raalte, & Linder, 1993) and the Public-Private Athletic Identity Scale (PPAIS; Nasco & Webb, 2006) measure athletic identity, there are no instruments to date that assess the psychosocial nuances of running identity, or the degree to which one identifies with the runner role. Therefore, the purpose of the current study was to develop a reliable and valid scale that assesses running identity. Items were created based on a literature review and a modified Delphi technique (Hsu & Sandford, 2007). Four hundred thirty-seven high-level U.S. runners completed 30 preliminary items in addition to the AIMS, PPAIS, demographic items, and three open-ended questions about running identity. An exploratory factor analysis with principal axis factoring and direct oblimin rotation was utilized to analyze the psychometric properties of the instrument. The resulting solution comprised 11 items and three factors: (a) Running Performance (α = .82); (b) Running Exclusivity (α = .81); and (c) Running Self-Identity (α = .67). The Cronbach’s alpha reliability coefficient for the overall scale was .85. Running Identity Scale scores were positively correlated with both AIMS ( r = .69, p < .01) and PPAIS scores (r = .56, p < .01), which demonstrated convergent validity. Implications and future directions are also discussed. Keywords: athletic identity, distance running, cross-country, track and field vi Preface This dissertation is divided into three main sections. In Section One, a manuscript version of the study, which entails a brief introduction, methods, results, and discussion, is presented. Section Two includes an extended literature review, which includes four main topical areas: (a) sociocultural aspects of running; (b) identity, athletic identity, and social identity; (c) changes in athletic identity during injury, retirement, and forced termination; and (d) confirmatory factor analysis. In Section Three, an extended discussion of the results is provided. vii Table of Contents Section 1: Manuscript ......................................................................................................... 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 1 Running Identity ......................................................................................... 3 Statement of Problem .................................................................................. 5 Methods................................................................................................................... 6 Participants .................................................................................................. 6 Procedures ................................................................................................... 7 Phase I: Creation of Items ............................................................... 7 Literature Review................................................................ 8 Delphi Technique ................................................................ 9 Phase II: Pretesting of Scale ........................................................... 11 Phase III: Pilot Testing of Scale...................................................... 11 Data Analysis .................................................................................. 13 Data Cleaning...................................................................... 13 Exploratory Factor Analysis ............................................... 14 Reliability ............................................................................ 15 Validity ............................................................................... 16 Results ..................................................................................................................... 16 Exploratory Factor Analysis ....................................................................... 16 Reliability .................................................................................................... 17 Validity ....................................................................................................... 18 Demographic