A comparison of knowledge and attitudes of athletes, coaches and sports officials participated in the Olympic Education courses of National Olympic & Paralympic Academy of Iran toward Olympic Values

Abstract

This study is carried out to assess and compare knowledge and attitudes of athletes, coaches and sports officials´ participated in the Olympic education courses of National Olympic & Paralympic Academy of Iran toward Olympic values. The study is a quantitative, descriptive research. Some 135 athletes, coaches and sports officials participated in the study, a questionnaire with four categories was used to collect the required data from the participants. Multiple choice questions on the Olympic values were asked to gauge the knowledge level. A 4-point Likert scale was used as the instrument to measure attitudes towards Olympic values while they were also asked to state their sport career, age, gender and education. The results nearly showed equal knowledge and attitudes of athletes, coaches and sports officials with respect to the Olympic values. Agreement percentage of athletes, coaches and officials is 97.5%, 100.0% and 96.9% and disagreement percentage athletes, coaches and officials toward Olympic values is 0.0%, 0.0% and 3.1% in order On the other hand, results showed that in general, the respondents have an acceptable knowledge and attitudes towards Olympic values. It is assumed that National Olympic Committee and National Olympic & Paralympic Academy of Iran sufficiently carried out their mission regarding the promotion of Olympic values trough implementing various courses, workshops and activities for different groups. It is recommended that Iranian NOPA embark on organizing consistent Olympic values educational programs for PE teachers in order to convince Iranian Ministry of Education to include Olympic values program in the school curriculum.