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Athletes’ Injury and Retirement Status on Mental Health

Rickert, K. & Matyas, J.

Rochester Christian University, Department of Psychology, Rochester Hills, MI 48307

Introduction

Methods

Conclusions & �Future Research

References

Results

  • Injuries can affect athletes’ self-esteem and athletic identity in addition to stressors.
  • Support systems are critical in the recovery process for injured athletes (Arasy et al., 2025).
  • Athletic identity can affect an athlete’s self-esteem and the trajectory of recovery progress (McGinley et al., 2024).
  • The results have the potential to provide better insight into an athlete’s mental health upon returning to their sport following an injury.
  • It was expected that athletes who were forced to retire and voluntarily retired post-injury had worse mental health (at the time) than athletes who were able to return to their sport.

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  • Target Population: Used 80 athletes who have experienced an injury throughout their career.
    • Must be 18 years or older.
  • Used cross-sectional data.
  • Utilized three scales: RAQ (Mowbray, 2011), DASS-10 (Halford and Frost, 2021), Psychological Readiness Scale (Podlog et al., 2024).

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Arasy, F., Subarjah, H., Haryono, T., & Mustaqim, R. (2025).

Analysis Role of Social Support in Mental Development of Athletes After Injury. Journal of Physical Education Health and Sport, 12(2), 412–418.

https://doi.org/10.15294/jpehs.v12i2.38493

McGinley, J., Stapleton, E., Gale, E., Worrall, H., Podvin, C.,

Ellis, H. B., Wilson, P.L., & Ulman, S. (2024). Differences

in athletic identity, sport participation, and psychosocial factors following anterior cruciate ligament rehabilitation in youth athletes. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, 1303887.

https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1303887

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  • Mental health levels did vary in athletes who were forced to retire, voluntarily retired, or returned to their sport.
  • Athletes that faced higher readiness levels also had higher resilience levels.
  • Athletes that faced higher resilience levels tended to have higher DASS levels.
  • Athletes that returned to sport had the highest readiness levels, whereas those forced to retire had the second highest levels.
  • More participants in the voluntarily retired and forced to retire groups would be beneficial, along with a larger sample size.

Fig. 5. Resilience levels compared to readiness levels

The relationship between resilience and readiness was shown to be statistically significant

[r(94) = +0.32, p < 0.01].

Fig. 1. Return to sport status and resilience levels

Athletes who were forced to retire following an injury had higher resilience levels regarding returning to their sport than those who voluntarily retired

[f(1,10) = 5.86, p > 0.036].

Fig. 4. Readiness levels compared to DASS levels

The relationship between readiness and DASS levels was statistically significant among injured athletes

[r(94) = +0.48, p > 0.001].

Fig. 6. Resilience levels compared to DASS levels

The relationships between resilience levels and DASS levels were statistically significant among injured athletes

[r(94) = +0.32, p < 0.01].

Fig. 3. Readiness levels on the return to sport status

Those who returned to their sport following an injury experienced higher levels of readiness compared to those who voluntarily retired following an injury

[f(2,75) = 2.32, p > 0.105].

Fig. 2. DASS levels in multisport athletes

Athletes who did not compete in multiple sports had greater depression and anxiety stress levels than those who competed in multiple sports. No significance was found

[f(1,66) = 3.07, p > 0.05].