Conformity of athletes: roles of type of sports, gender and competition experience.

The subject of the present research was conformity as athletes’ behavioral manner toward the coach and club management. The aim of the study was to establish differences in the conformity degree between groups of athletes, categorized under 3 criteria: type of sports, gender, and athletes’ competition experience. The sample of examinees consisted of 160 athletes. The research instrument was the conformity scale (The Conformity Scale, Mehrabian, & Stefl, 1995), used and confirmed in 2 earlier researches by Vučković et al. (2009, 2010). Data were analyzed by non-parametric Mann-Whitney test. Upon analysis, it’s been confirmed that: a) athletes are bigger conformists toward coach than club management, b) team sport athletes are bigger conformists toward a coach, c) there are no differences between male and female athletes in conformity toward coach and club management, d) there are no statistically significant differences between experienced and less experienced athletes in their conformity degree toward coach and e) less experienced athletes expressed bigger conformity toward club management in all examined statements.