Abstract:
The Mindfulness-Acceptance-Commitment (MAC) approach is a sport
psychology programme aimed at performance development in athletes. This
study set out to gain an understanding of how adolescent equestrian athletes
experienced this programme, using an in-depth qualitative approach called
interpretive phenomenology analysis (IPA). Four equestrians, three females and
one male, ranging in age from 16 to 18 years, completed an experiential
learning-based programme over a two-day period. Semi-structured interviews
were subsequently conducted with each participant to gain an understanding of
their experience of the programme in terms of (1) their learning regarding the
programme; (2) possible application of the learning to equestrian sport; and (3)
possible transference of the learning to other areas of their lives. The interviews
were transcribed and analysed according to the principles of IPA and the findings
pertaining to each participant are discussed in terms of the most significant
themes identified during the interviews. The concluding chapter discusses both
the common and the unique findings obtained from the participants’ accounts in
relation to the existing literature. The findings of this study highlight the
importance of the partnership between equine and human when applying MAC in
equestrian sport and also illustrate the applicability of MAC, not only in
equestrian sport, but also in other areas of an adolescent’s life. This project
contributes to sport psychology since it is the first qualitative study describing the
experiences of adolescent equestrians regarding the MAC approach.
