Abstract
Sports psychology literature has examined the personality variables mindfulness and gritprimarily within the context of sport performance, with a particular focus on
effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions. Minimal to no research has investigated
the significance of these variables with regard to sports injury, individual coping style,
and adherence to injury rehabilitation, thus little is known about how they might interact.
This study explored the relationship of mindfulness and grit on the number of sport
injuries, coping style, and rehabilitation adherence. Participants were 196 collegiate
student athletes who completed assessments of dispositional mindfulness, psychological
grit, sport injury, coping style, and rehabilitation adherence. Results showed that student
athletes’ level of mindfulness was predictive of their rehabilitation adherence, such that
as their level of mindfulness increased, so did the degree of adherence to their
rehabilitation. Student athletes’ level of grit was also predictive of rehabilitation
adherence, however it was an inverse relationship such that as their level of grit
increased, their rehabilitation adherence decreased. No relationship was found between
sport injury and both mindfulness and grit. Similarly, no associations were found between
mindfulness and grit and preferred style of coping with health problems and injuries.
Results are discussed within the context of not only measuring mindfulness and grit to
help predict how adherent an athlete would be to their injury rehabilitation, but also with
implementing mindfulness-based interventions to increase mindfulness and thus their
rehabilitation adherence.