Associations of Moral Disengagement, Passion, and Competitive Anger and Aggressiveness with Attitudes toward Performance Enhancing Drugs in Sport

Abstract

The main purpose of the study was to explore relationships between moral disengagement in sport and attitudes toward performance enhancing drugs. Additionally, the purpose was to explore specific mechanisms of moral disengagement in sport in relation to attitudes toward performance enhancing drugs and the role that emotion might play in this relationship. A secondary purpose of the study was to investigate relationships between moral disengagement in sport with a variety of factors that have not been associated with moral disengagement in sport before (i.e., competitive anger and aggressiveness and obsessive and harmonious passion). Participants were 587 male and female varsity and co-ed intramural athletes from four Southern Ontario universities. Athletes completed a battery of scales that assessed moral disengagement in sport, attitudes toward performance enhancing drugs, guilt and shame, obsessive and harmonious passion, and competitive anger and aggressiveness. Results for the primary research questions indicated that moral disengagement in sport positively predicted attitudes toward performance enhancing drugs. More specifically, the non-responsibility mechanism of moral disengagement in sport was the only mechanism that positively predicted more lenient attitudes toward performance enhancing drugs, while advantageous comparison was a significant negative predictor of attitudes toward performance enhancement drugs. The results indicated that emotion had no moderation effect on the relationship between moral disengagement in sport and attitudes toward performance enhancing substances. In relation to the secondary research questions, data indicated that competitive anger and aggressiveness as well as obsessive passion positively predicted moral disengagement in sport, while harmonious passion negatively associated with moral disengagement in sport. Additionally, the results indicated that aggressiveness and obsessive passion were positive predictors of attitudes toward performance enhancement drug use, while harmonious passion was a significant negative predictor of performance enhancing drugs. Possible explanations for these findings and group differences of the sample are discussed as well as limitations and possibilities for future research. Implications for practice are also discussed in relation to educational possibilities for university level athletes and competitive recreational participants.