Investigation of the relationship between the self-confidence and motivation of high school students participating school sport contests

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships between the levels of self-confidence and motivation of high school students participating sport contests at school and the various demographic variables (gender, high school type, sport age, sports branch and sport category). In the study, survey model, which is frequently used in descriptive research method is used. The population of the study consisted of students who studied at high schools and those who attended contests in Adıyaman, while sample consisted of 856 athletes, 39% of whom were female students (334) and 61% (522) of whom were male students. To collect data for the study, personal data form, ''Motivation in Sport'' scale, which was developed by Pelletier et al. (1995) and adapted to Turkish by Pelletier et al. and ''Self-confidence'' scale developed by Akın (2007) were used. SPSS 21.00 package program was used for data analysis. Multiple regression analysis, Pearson product-moment correlation co-efficient technique, independent t-test and one-way analysis of variance were performed in the quantitative data of the research. According to the findings obtained from the study, it was determined that there was a significant relationship between demographic information and self-confidence and motivation levels. While there was a significant difference in gender self-confidence level with intrinsic and extrinsic self-confidence and high school type sports branch, there was no significant difference between sport age and sport category. A significant relationship was found between the sub-dimension of non-motivation, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation, and there was no significant relationship with other independent variables such as gender, sports branch, sport category and sport age. Based on these results, it is recommended that secondary school students participate in sports competitions to have some elements that may have positive effects on their self-confidence and motivation.