What is it about?
Sports-related injuries occur at rates ranging from 0.5 to 34 per 1,000 practice hours and are a leading cause of early retirement, with psychosocial factors influencing recovery. Injury prevention remains a priority because of its financial and performance impacts on teams. Psychological factors, such as attention disturbances, negative life events, and arousal levels, can impact an athlete’s risk of injury, although psychological interventions are rarely used in sports. Fear of failure, a major stress factor, negatively affects athletes’ motivation and self-perception. Stress and recovery responses vary across cultures, with European and American athletes employing different strategies. Understanding these cultural differences could help tailor interventions to improve performance and wellbeing. This study compared stress and recovery parameters between American and European student-athletes. This observational pilot clinical trial aimed to assess stress and quality of life among young athletes from two universities: Universidad Europea de Madrid UEM and Saint Louis University (SLU), in pre-season conditions. Participants recruited from their respective soccer teams completed a one-time questionnaire to assess social- and sports-related stress. The study followed ethical guidelines and the questionnaires included tools such as the POMS, RESTQ-52, and the Groningen Sleep Questionnaire. This study found significant differences between the groups across various stress categories, including general, emotional, social, and sports-specific stress, as well as fatigue and disturbed breaks, with p-values ranging from 0.005 to 0.035. The effect sizes for these differences were moderate, with values ranging from r = -0.321 to r = -0.429. Overall, significant differences between the groups were observed, with moderate effect sizes for both general and Overall Stress Scores (r = -0.397 and r = -0.414, respectively). This study highlights significant cultural differences in stress, recovery, sleep quality, and mood between student-athletes at UEM and SLU. These findings emphasize the need for tailored psychological interventions and recovery strategies that address athletes’ unique stressors and cultural environments and improve their performance and wellbeing.
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Why is it important?
This article is important because it shows that stress, recovery, sleep, and mood in university athletes differ significantly between European and American athletes, indicating that culture and the academic–sport environment directly influence their wellbeing and injury risk. By highlighting these differences using validated psychological questionnaires, the study provides practical evidence for coaches, medical staff, and universities to design psychological interventions and recovery strategies tailored to each context, with the aim of improving performance, preventing burnout, and protecting the mental health of student-athletes.
Perspectives
As the author of this work, my main motivation was to better understand how the cultural and university context shapes stress, recovery, and ultimately the psychological wellbeing of university athletes, beyond purely physical or performance data. Throughout my experience with student-athletes, I have observed that many face very high academic and athletic demands but lack structured psychological support, and I suspected that this might manifest differently in Europe and the United States. With this study, I wanted to provide evidence that helps make visible that stress, sleep, and mood are not “secondary” aspects, but central elements in injury prevention, career longevity, and players’ quality of life. My goal is for these results to serve as a starting point for coaches, medical staff, and universities to systematically incorporate psychological assessments and intervention programs tailored to each cultural context, and for the mental wellbeing of student-athletes to be considered a key indicator of both athletic and academic success.
Eduardo García Laredo
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Psychological wellbeing of student-athletes: a comparative study between European and American athletes, Frontiers in Psychology, July 2025, Frontiers,
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1604783.
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