Abstract
Sports
have turned out to be a global success factor for many countries. It was
revealed that the sports performance of table tennis players of Sri Lanka in
the international arena is not attractive. This is proven from the medal tables
of Olympic, Asian Games, and South Asian Games. There are many factors
affecting sports performance which can be broadly categorized under player
Related factors, coach-related factors, administrative factors and,
Environmental factors. A review of the recent literature relating to
player-related factors revealed that achievement motivation is among the key
factors which had proven successive results. Therefore, the main purpose of the
study was to analyze the correspondence between achievement motivation and
perceived performance. Achievement motivation was assessed by the constructs
namely, the hope of success and fear of failure. This study utilized gender as
a moderating variable, suggesting that the perception of achievement motivation
and performance differ as per gender. The study was conducted during all Island
ranking tournaments held in January 2020 and considered only the table tennis
players. The study population was 80 (n=80) male and female top-ranking Table
Tennis players. Universal sampling technique was used and considered
top-ranking male and female players as the sample. Only 55 completed
questionnaires were received and were utilized for data analysis. Achievement
motivation questioner and athlete perception of player performance test were
administered to collect the data. Statistical calculations were conducted using
SPSS version 21. Cronbach’s alpha obtained with the present sample was well
above 0.7. Appropriate correlations with theoretically linked constructs
demonstrated criterion and concurrent validity. Methods used to analyze data
were general linear model and multiple linear regression. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to
analyze the effects of the modering variable of gender. It was found that fear
of failure was a significant predictor of perceived performance (p=0.025)
whereas the hope of success was not a significant predictor (p>0.05). When
considering the overall impact of achievement motivation on performance, the
results revealed that achievement motivation impacts performance (p<0.05).
Based on moderation interaction results obtained through the hierarchical
multiple regression method, it was revealed that gender does not moderate the
relationship between achievement motivation and perceived performance
(p<0.05). The findings of the study may influence researchers to engage in
further research and also will be helpful for coaches to focus on players'
motivational goals to gain and generate higher performance.
