Religious Belief vs. Religious Practice. What is More Beneficial to Elite Athletes? An Investigation of Religious/Spiritual Belief, and its Relationship to Challenge & Threat Appraisal

Religiosity/spirituality has been linked with reduced anxiety in athlete populations. This study set out to assess the impact of religious/spiritual belief, opposed to practice, to see whether it too would predict anxiety, as well as feelings of control and cognitive appraisal in elite athletes insert ignore into journalissuearticles values(N = 115);. Self-reported self-efficacy, control, achievement goals, life satisfaction, trait anxiety and strength of belief in a higher power insert ignore into journalissuearticles values(SBHP); were measured and analysed with simple linear regressions and multiple regressions insert ignore into journalissuearticles values(with challenge and threat appraisals as the dependent variables);. The models predicting both challenge and threat appraisal were found to be significant, although SBHP was not a significant predictor, nor was it significantly predicative of any of the variables, or significantly correlated with them. The contribution of religious/spiritual belief to psychological benefits is compared to religious/spiritual practice and discussed alongside implications for future research and applied practice.