Advancing on the road of psychological differentiation of sportsmen. Examples in differences in sex and sport mode

Psychological descriptions of athletes should not be constrained to a list of abilities. Rather, they require descriptions of relations among its priority, variability or compensation within a person-sport system. The sample (N=623), mean age 23.96, is randomly distributed by sex (male=64.8%, female=35.2%) and type of sport (individual=32.58%; team=67.41%). Variables such as personality, motivation, and beliefs in sport success are analysed. Variability among athletes´ qualities has an impact on their relationships with others; in particular, women are gentler, as well as more persistent and determined, while men are more stable and sociable in team sports, and show greater open-mindedness in individual sports, more extrinsic motivational orientation, and beliefs of effort to succes in women and individual sports. The personsport relationship is a framework for discovering and learning which attitudes are involved in the development of traits such as responsibility, achievement, self-control, achievement motivation, persistence of effort, as well as other relevant intermediary processes.