The Effects of Psychological Factors in Sports Medicine Rehabilitation Adherence

This study investigated the influence of achievement motivation and self-esteem on injury treatment adherence in a general sample of injured patients receiving treatment in a sports medicine clinic. Subjects consisted of both injured athletes and workers who had incurred an on-the-job injury. Based on scales of self-esteem and achievement motivation, patients were categorized as either high or low in self-esteem certainty, self-esteem level, tendency to be task-involved, and tendency to ego-involved in tasks. Treatment adherence was measured by number of missed appointments and by physical therapist ratings of effort and progress. It was found that patients low in self-esteem certainty and high in ego-involvement tended to miss the most treatment appointments. Contrary to previous findings, task-involvement was not found to be related to treatment adherence.