Darko Jekauc

Karlsruhe Institute of Technology | KIT · Institute of Sports Science

Enjoyment is recognized as a determinant of physical activity habits. The enjoyment of engaging in physical activity can be measured with the Physical Activity Enjoyment Scale (PACES). Later versions of this scale have been shortened to capture the component of subjective feeling, which has been validated using German-speaking samples. The aim of t...

This paper investigates whether personality traits, specifically neuroticism and extraversion, influence the relationship between the enjoyment of physical activity and the formation of physical activity habits. The study analyzed data from 724 participants and found that physical activity enjoyment positively relates to habit formation. Neuroticis...

The purpose of this study is to analyze the influence of socio-structural determinants of physical activity (PA) behavior in children and adolescents. We expected that socioeconomic status, social support, and physical environment influence PA directly while socioeconomic status also has an indirect influence via social support and physical environ...

The integration of digital interventions in health rehabilitation offers promising opportunities to improve patient outcomes. However, empirical studies comparing the effectiveness of digital and traditional rehabilitation interventions remain scarce. This study was designed to evaluate the impact of a digital aftercare program, compared to traditi...

Emotions have a strong influence on decisions and motivation. Therefore, it is important to master the regulation of emotions. Mindfulness helps in this regard by teaching to accept perceived feelings without judgment, thus enabling them to be let go more quickly.

Against the backdrop of elite athletes' experiences with mindfulness training, a mindfulness program specifically for the context of sports was developed. The program is based on five principles: awareness of values, conscious perception of one's own body and thoughts, awareness of one's own impact, acceptance of one's own feelings and thoughts, an...

A mindful lifestyle can only be achieved if one regularly incorporates exercises into daily life. To create habits, one can apply various methods. One can attach mindfulness exercises to an already existing habit, create reminders, plan for dealing with obstacles, or reward oneself after the work is done.

Mindfulness originates from an Eastern tradition and has made its way into the psychology of competitive sports in the last century. In the 1990s, basketball coach Phil Jackson successfully introduced mindfulness practices in the American NBA. His former student Steve Kerr now very successfully applies mindfulness techniques as a coach to provide s...

Each of us thinks, feels, and acts based on a structure that is built through experiences and values, and it facilitates the perception and classification of information in everyday life. This structure is called a mental model. To reflect on the mental model, a value-free observer attitude can be adopted. This allows the patterns behind thoughts a...

Stress is a constant companion in a time when efficiency and productivism are becoming increasingly important. What many know: Multitasking does not save time. In fact, it is significantly more efficient (and makes you happier) if you only focus on the task at hand. This also applies to athletes, in whose lives stress is a fixed component due to th...

Mindfulness means consciously having attention in the present moment, without judging or evaluating it. The origin of mindfulness lies in a Buddhist mindset. A distinction is made between formal meditation, such as breath or walking meditation, and informal meditation, such as mindfulness in everyday life. The mechanisms of action of mindfulness tr...

The management of emotions appears to be a crucial factor for achieving peak performance in sports. Emotions can be understood as a cyclical process, triggered by expectations and perceived consequences, which can plunge us into a turmoil of feelings or a spiral of emotions. Mindfulness can help break this cycle of emotions and stabilize performanc...

Body perception is important for being aware of internal bodily processes. Knowledge about internal bodily processes enables the regulation of one’s emotions. Body perception can be improved through psychoeducation and trained through simple exercises.

Our thoughts influence how we feel. Especially when these thoughts have negative effects on our mood, it is important to break them. To do this, one can perceive and select their thoughts from the position of an external observer, determining which of these thoughts are helpful and justified.

Automated thought patterns help to classify situations more quickly. However, it is important to regularly reflect on and review existing thought patterns (as well as values and attitudes) to see if they fit the current stage of life.

We have developed a model for the formation and development of crises in professional soccer. Players often describe their experiences of crisis in terms of a vortex that pulls them deeper into distress and dysfunction, despite their best efforts to escape. This metaphor aptly characterizes the complex interplay of psychological, social, and organi...

The adoption and maintenance of physical activity (PA) is an important health behavior. This paper presents the first comprehensive empirical test of the Physical Activity Adoption and Maintenance (PAAM) model, which proposes that a combination of explicit (e.g., intention) and implicit (e.g., habit,, affect) self-regulatory processes is involved i...

This study describes an AI model by leveraging advanced Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) to recognize affective states in real-world sports settings, particularly tennis matches. In contrast to prior studies that primarily utilized data acquired from actors and rudimentary statistical methods, the present research emphasizes the analysis of bod...

Background and aim Rehabilitation programs have been shown to have a positive impact on patients' health and work ability. However, the durability of these effects and the extent to which patients alter their health behaviors remain underexplored. This study is divided into two parts; the first assesses the effectivity of rehabilitation programs fo...

Introduction Emotions consist of different components such as the emotional experience, physiological reactions, action tendencies, or emotional expressions. Assessing the relation of these components may help to better understand the role of emotions in sport competitions. Based on the component process model of emotions, the goal of the present s...

While the tactical behavior of soccer players differs between specific phases of play (offense, defense, offensive transition, defensive transition), little is known about successful behavior of players during defensive transition (switching behavior from offense to defense). Therefore, this study aims to analyze the group tactic of rest defense (d...

Background This quasi-experimental study aimed to compare the effectiveness of a digital prevention intervention on work ability, physical health, and mental health with a conventional prevention program for employees with initial impairments. The study recruited 245 participants, of whom 173 completed the study, 98 (65 female, 66.3%) in the interv...

Emotional convergence describes the transfer of emotions between individuals. Complementing recent research that has highlighted the importance of considering the social nature of emotions in sport psychology, the purpose of the present review was to provide an overview of the role of emotional convergence in sport and, based on this, to set an age...

Background Fitness has important implications for physical activity behavior and is associated with various health-related outcomes. It can be assessed through a test battery or a self-reported questionnaire. One example is the FFB-Mot (Funktionsfragebogen Motorik; engl. functional fitness questionnaire) which consist of 28 items to assess four com...

In soccer, the offensive style of play describes characteristic behavioral features of the players at team level during the offensive phase of matches. This study aimed to investigate the effect of offensive playing style (i.e., while in ball possession) on physical and technical match performance during offensive play as well as success-related fa...

The interest in tactical analysis in soccer has increased in the latest years, especially with the growing availability of player tracking data. With it, the defending team's compact organization, which is considered by practitioners to be an important factor in defense, was repeatedly examined. However, the connection between this defensive princi...

Zusammenfassung: Strauch, Wäsche und Jekauc (2018 ; 2019 ) entwickelten ein Kompetenzmodell, das die drei Handlungskompetenzen Motivations-‍, Adaptations- und Organisationskompetenz der Übungsleitenden als Einflussfaktoren der positiven affektiven Reaktionen in Bewegungsprogrammen postuliert. Das Ziel der vorliegenden Studie war es, ein Messinstrum...

This quasi-experimental study aimed to compare the effectiveness of a digital prevention intervention on work ability, physical health, and mental health with a conventional prevention program for professionals with initial impairments. The study recruited 245 participants, of whom 173 fully participated and completed the study, 98 (65 female, 66.3...

To counteract low physical activity levels in children and adolescents, it is crucial to understand the relevant psychological processes that can promote physical activity in this age group. The Weiss-Harter model focuses on self-esteem as a central construct for physical activity promotion in youth, which mediates the effects of perceived competen...

Background: We examined the longitudinal association between (change in) physical activity (PA) with new onset of five risk factors of metabolic syndrome among 657 middle-aged adults (mean age 44.1 (standard deviation (SD) 8.6) years) who were free of the respective outcome at baseline, in a longitudinal cohort study spanning over 29 years. Metho...

The purpose of the present study was to assess whether the recognition of tennis players’ affective state associated with their nonverbal behavior would be influenced by (a) the importance of the situation, (b) the point outcome, and (c) the tennis expertise of the observer. Two hundred sixty-nine participants ( M age = 30.51 years; 116 female; 79...

Classroom disruptions and disruptive behaviour occur frequently in physical education and can constitute important psychological stress factors. However, so far, the relationships between disruptive behaviour and emotions in physical education have not been studied in detail. Therefore, a systematic literature review was conducted, to explore these...

Recently, the availability of big amounts of data enables analysts to dive deeper into the constraints of performance in various team sports. While offensive analyses in football have been extensively conducted, the evaluation of defensive performance is underrepresented in this sport. Hence, the aim of this study was to analyze successful defensiv...

Objective: This study examined associations between physical activity (PA) and neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in older adults free of dementia. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 3,222 individuals ≥70 years of age (1,655 men; mean±SD age=79.2±5.6; cognitively unimpaired, N=2,723; mild cognitive impairment, N=499) from the population-b...

A new measure of the short form of the Physical Activity Enjoyment Scale (PACES-S), including four items, has been developed that focuses on the subjective experience of enjoyment. As validation has so far only been conducted in a youth population, the purpose of the present article was to test the psychometric properties of the measure in an adult...

We examined the longitudinal association between physical activity (PA) and the risk of incident metabolic syndrome (MetS) among middle-aged, community-dwelling adults, including 591 individuals (314 females; mean (SD) age, 43.8 (8.5) years) who were free of MetS at baseline. Habitual and sports-related PA was assessed by a self-reported questionna...

The tactical formation is considered an important factor in soccer, however, changes in tactical formation during matches (ingame) and the distinction between offensive and defensive formations has rarely been considered in previous studies analyzing match performance. Therefore, objectives of this studywere to investigate the following research qu...

The visible non-verbal behavior of volleyball players after a point might indicate their affective state. The purpose of the present study was to investigate whether the point outcome (i.e., win vs. loss) and the importance of the situation (i.e., first vs. fifth set) influence how well the affective states (indexed through non-verbal behavior) can...

Der Kreislauf der Emotionen kann wie kaum ein anderes Phänomen unsere Leistungen im Sport stark beeinflussen. Aus diesem Grund setzt eine Vielzahl an Spitzensportlern auf das Achtsamkeitstraining als eine Form des Trainings der mentalen Stärke und Emotionsregulation. Prominente Beispiele sind Novak Djokovic im Tennis, Phil Jackson im Basketball ode...

The present study contains an affect-based intervention intended to support exercise trainers in positively influencing their course participants’ affective responses to their exercise courses. We argue that positive affective responses are associated with habit formation, thereby being a promising approach for avoiding high drop-out rates in exerc...

Background Previous research has shown evidence on the role of affective states for physical activity behavior. However, there is a lack of research investigating the interplay between affective states, intentions, and exercise behavior, especially with respect to maintaining regular exercise over time. The study aimed to investigate whether post-e...

Future-oriented emotions could influence our decisions in everyday life and help understand why some individuals are physically active whilst others are not. Current literature distinguishes between two future-oriented emotion constructs: anticipatory and anticipated emotions. While anticipatory emotions are currently experienced emotions about a f...

Overweight and obesity, including its prevalence and consequences reflect a leading public health problem. Studies have already shown that physical activity leads to a reduction in body weight in children and adults. However, the university setting has rarely been investigated. The aim of this review is therefore to examine and summarize the effect...

The tactical formation has been shown to influence the match performance of professional soccer players. This study aimed to examine the effects of in-game changes in tactical formation on match performance and to analyze coach-specific differences. We investigated three consecutive seasons of an elite team in the German Bundesliga which were manag...

The aim of the study was to examine the impact of the positional role and the individuality on the technical match performance in professional soccer players. From official match data of the Bundesliga season 2018/19, technical performance [short (<10 m)/medium (10–30 m)/long (>30 m) passes, dribblings, ball possessions] of all players who played d...

The number of investigations that specifically address the influence of formation on soccer performance has increased in recent years. Since there is no overview that summarizes these effects, this systematic review aims to synthesize the available literature on the effects of tactical formation on physical and technical match performance. Accordin...

In tennis, the non-verbal behaviours shown after a rally may indicate the affective state of players. The purpose of the present study was to assess whether (a) the point outcome, (b) the duration of video-excerpts, and (c) the tennis expertise of the participants would influence the recognition rates of the affective state. To that end, 115 partic...

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether tactical formation affects the physical and technical match performance of professional soccer players in the first German Bundesliga. From official match data of the Bundesliga season 2018/19, physical (total distance, high-intensity distance, sprinting distance, accelerations, maximum velocity)...

The analysis of tracking data in tactical game analysis is a topic of rising interest, as more detailed insights into performance structure in soccer can be obtained compared to traditional (e.g. notational) analyzes. Compared to the variety and detailed analyzes of offensive play, the number of studies analyzing the defensive play is low. However,...

A perspective on self-talk introduced in the literature distinguishes between organic self-talk and strategic self-talk. Based on this perspective, the purpose of the present scoping review was to (a) give a comprehensive overview of studies investigating the relationship between organic self-talk and affective processes and (b) review the effectiv...

Attention is a key success factor in elite sports. Mindfulness training is suspected to be a determinant of attention. The present study was a wait-list controlled investigation of the effects of a mindfulness-based sport psychology program on sustained and selective attention in young elite athletes ( n = 137) and the effects of mindfulness traini...

Der Kreislauf der Emotionen kann wie kaum ein anderes Phänomen unsere Leistungen im Sport stark beeinflussen. Aus diesem Grund setzt eine Vielzahl an Spitzensportlern auf das Achtsamkeitstraining als eine Form des Trainings der mentalen Stärke und Emotionsregulation. Prominente Beispiele sind Novak Djokovic im Tennis, Phil Jackson im Basketball ode...

Until recently, emotional processes have played little role in personality psychology. Based on neuroscientific findings, Davidson and colleagues proposed a theory of emotional styles, postulating six dimensions of emotional life: outlook, resilience, social intuition, self-awareness, sensitivity to context, and attention. Recently, an English vers...

In this article, we introduce a theory on the dynamic development of affective processes, affect regulation, and the relationship between emotions and sport performance. The theory focusses on how affective processes emerge and develop during competitive sport involvement. Based on Scherer’s component process model, we postulate six components of e...

Objective The purposes of this paper were to a) develop a new short, theory-driven, version of the Physical Activity Enjoyment Scale (PACES-S) using content analysis; and b) subsequently to measure the psychometric properties (construct validity, internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and concurrent validity) of the PACES-S for adolescents....

Zusammenfassung Hintergrund Gesundheit, Freude/Spaß, Figur und Gesellschaft sind Motive für sportliche Aktivitäten. Es ist unklar, welcher Zusammenhang zwischen ihrer Ausprägung, Alter, Geschlecht, Schmerzen und Trainingsumfang besteht. Material und Methoden In dieser Untersuchung wurden 792 sportlich aktive Männer und Frauen (68 % Frauen und 32...

Background Obesity is considered an epidemic problem with an increasing number of individuals affected. The physical and psychological complaints associated with obesity point to the importance of implementing effective interventions. Innovative mHealth applications appear to be promising in helping provide a continuous and flexible support during...

Physical fitness is an indicator for children’s public health status. Therefore, the aim of this study was to examine the construct validity and the criterion-related validity of the German motor test (GMT) in Egyptian schoolchildren. A cross-sectional study was conducted with a total of 931 children aged 6 to 11 years (age: 9.1 ± 1.7 years) with 4...