ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Sport Psychology
This article is part of the Research TopicDeterminants of Achievement in Top SportView all 33 articles
Effects of Coaches' Transformational Leadership Behavior on Team Cohesion: The Mediating Role of Mental Toughness
Provisionally accepted
- The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, SAR China
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The leadership behavior of coaches has always been the focus of research in the field of sports, and the effect of coaches' leadership behavior on team cohesion is even more of a hot research issue. Previous studies have shown that coach leadership behaviors influence individual athletes' participation in sports, thereby affecting team cohesion. Compared with traditional leadership styles, transformational leadership behavior focuses on the interaction between coaches and athletes, so more and more scholars have begun introducing transformational leadership behavior into research related to sports coaching. Additionally, mental toughness as a psychological ability plays an important role in athletes facing challenges and adversity, and is also a factor worth studying. However, current research has not yet fully explored the relationship between coaches' transformational leadership behavior, team cohesion, and mental toughness, so this may be an area worthy of further research to fill some gaps in existing research. This study was a cross-sectional study, 123 high-level athletes in colleges and universities of China completed the Transformational Leadership Questionnaire, Group Cohesion Questionnaire, and Sports Mental Toughness Questionnaire. SPSS statistical software was used to conduct descriptive, Pearson correlation, and mediation analysis of the collected questionnaire data, to verify whether mental toughness plays a mediating role between coaches' transformational leadership behavior and team cohesion. The results showed that coaches' transformational leadership behavior perceived by college athletes were associated with the team cohesion and the mental toughness of athletes, mental toughness partially mediated the relationship between transformational leadership and team cohesion, with a mediating effect of 16.34 %. The results provided a basis for improving the coach's leadership behavior, coaching philosophy, and promoting team cohesion.
Keywords: Coach Behavior, Transformational leadership, team cohesion, Mental toughness, sports psychology, college athletes
Received: 26 Aug 2025; Accepted: 03 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 PENG and Wong. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Ming Yu Claudia Wong, cmywong@eduhk.hk
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