Investigating the Moderating Role of Athlete Leadership on Leadership Behaviors and Perceptions of Cohesion

Athlete leadership has been defined as an athlete occupying a formal or informal role within the team, who influences a group of team members towards achieving a common goal (Loughead et al., 2006). The purpose of the present study was to examine whether an athlete's leadership status (i.e., formal athlete leader, informal athlete leader, athlete non-leader) moderated the leadership behavior to cohesion relationship. Overall, four moderation results were found. The relationship between Positive Feedback and ATG-T, ATG-S, and GI-T differed between informal athlete leaders and athlete non-leaders. In addition, Positive Feedback to GI-T differed between formal athlete leaders and athlete non-leaders. In all cases, the relationship between Positive Feedback and cohesion was in a positive direction for athlete leaders, and in a negative direction for athlete non-leaders. For all other relationships, no differences were found between leadership statuses, indicating a sense of shared leadership amongst teammates. Practical implications of these results are discussed.