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A holistic ecological approach to sport and study: The case of an athlete friendly
university in Denmark

Kristoffer Henriksen, Louise Kamuk Storm, Andreas Kuettel, Lukas Linnér, Natalia
Stambulova

PII: S1469-0292(19)30483-2
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2019.101637
Reference: PSYSPO 101637

To appear in: Psychology of Sport & Exercise

Received Date: 29 June 2019

Revised Date: 1 December 2019
Accepted Date: 3 December 2019

Please cite this article as: Henriksen, K., Storm, L.K., Kuettel, A., Linnér, L., Stambulova, N., A
holistic ecological approach to sport and study: The case of an athlete friendly university in Denmark,
Psychology of Sport & Exercise (2020), doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2019.101637.

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 A Holistic Ecological Approach to Sport and Study: The Case of an Athlete Friendly

University in Denmark

Kristoffer Henriksen1, Louise Kamuk Storm1, Andreas Kuettel1, Lukas Linnér2, & Natalia

Stambulova2

1
Institute of Sport Science and Clinical Biomechanics, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
2
School of Social and Health Sciences, Halmstad University, Halmstad, Sweden

Corresponding Author:

Kristoffer Henriksen

Institute of Sport Science and Clinical Biomechanics, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Campusvej 55, 5230 Odense, Denmark

Tel: (0045) 51908192

E-mail: khenriksen@health.sdu.dk
 A Holistic Ecological Approach to Sport and Study:

The Case of an Athlete Friendly University in Denmark

Revision 2

0
 Abstract

Objectives: Dual career development environments (DCDEs) exist to support student-athletes in

their endeavours to combine sport with education or work. Such environments are likely to vary in

their structure, processes, philosophy, and degree of efficiency. With the overall aim of applying the

holistic ecological approach (Henriksen, Stambulova & Roessler, 2010) to the study of DCDEs, the

objectives of the present study are: (a) to provide a holistic description of a Danish athlete-friendly

university as a DCDE, and (b) to investigate the factors influencing the environment’s

effectiveness.

Methodology: Based on two working models, the study takes a case study approach and a real-time

perspective and uses multiple sources of data (interviews, observations, and documents).

Results: Two empirical models summarize the findings and portray the DCDE as: (1) centred on a

dual career (DC) support team that serves to support communication and coordination between the

sport, study, and private domains; (2) focused on providing individual solutions for each athlete; (3)

teaching student-athletes to plan, prioritize, communicate, and take responsibility for the balance in

their DC endeavour; and (4) deeply rooted in a shared DC philosophy that puts sport first and

recognizes that the student-athletes must be seen as whole persons.

Conclusion: Researcher-practitioners in the DC context are encouraged to focus not only on the

challenges and coping strategies of the individual student-athletes but to understand and (if

necessary) optimize the entire environment around them.

Keywords: Dual career, Dual career development environment, Student-athletes, University.

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 A Holistic Ecological Approach to Sport and Study:

The Case of an Athlete Friendly University in Denmark

In this case study we took inspiration and insights from the holistic ecological approach

(HEA) established in talent development research (Henriksen, Stambulova, & Roessler, 2010;

Henriksen & Stambulova, 2017) to explore holistically a Danish athlete-friendly university as a

dual career development environment (DCDE). This study forms part of the ERASMUS + Sport

project “Ecology of Dual Career” (ECO-DC), and within the project consortium, a DCDE is

defined as a purposefully developed system that aims to facilitate athletes’ investment in combining

their competitive sporting careers with education or work. Below we provide a brief overview of

current Dual Career (DC) research in Europe and the ECO-DC project, outlining key features of the

HEA and their application in developing two ecological DC frameworks to guide this study’s

objectives, data collection, and presentation of findings.

DC Research in Europe and the ECO-DC Project

DC research is currently spread worldwide. Acknowledging DC studies conducted in North

America (Blodgett & Schinke, 2015; Yukhymenko-Lescroart, 2018), Australia and New Zealand

(Cosh & Tully, 2015; Ryan, Thorpe, & Pope, 2017), Asia and Africa (Sum et al. 2017; Tshube &

Feltz, 2015), we further narrow our focus to the studies within the European DC discourse

(Stambulova & Wylleman, 2019) as the most relevant to the ECO-DC project and our case.

The first systematic review of European DC research (Guidotti, Cortis, & Capranica, 2015)

summarized 49 studies published in 2007-2014, i.e. since the term DC (namely a combination of

sport and education or work) was first introduced in a White Paper on Sport (European

Commission, 2007). Guidotti and colleagues identified four DC dimensions (i.e. individual,

interpersonal, social/organizational and political) typically studied separately, and concluded that

future research should “explore the intertwined relationships between different dimensions of DC”

(p.17). The recent state-of-the-art review on the psychology of European athletes’ DCs (Stambulova

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& Wylleman, 2019) embraced 42 peer-reviewed publications issued between 2015 and July 2018

and consisted of quantitative and qualitative mapping, narrative description and critical analysis of

the included studies with the aim of defining the knowledge gaps and future challenges. This review

revealed that the principal aim of European researchers is to increase the body of knowledge about

DCs in sport and education from “a whole person” or holistic developmental perspective

(Wylleman, Reints, & De Knop, 2013). This research covers several interrelated themes, including:

DC pathways and transitions with relevant demands, resources, barriers, and coping strategies

(Brown et al., 2015; De Brandt, Wylleman, Torregrossa, Defruyt, & Van Rossem, 2017; Debois,

Ledon, & Wylleman, 2015; Stambulova, Engstrӧm, Franck, Linnér, & Lindahl, 2015), student-

athletes’ motivation, identity, health, lifestyle, and wellbeing in relation to DC and retirement (Lupo

et al., 2015; Ryba et al., 2016; Torregrossa, Ramis, Pallarés, Azócar, & Selva, 2015), and DC

support services and programmes with recommendations for their optimization (Knight, Harwood,

& Sellars, 2018; López de Subijana, Barriopedro, & Sanz, 2015). Together, the analysed studies

revealed a complicated mosaic of various internal and external factors interplaying in student-

athletes’ development, with each individual study illuminating only a fragment of this mosaic rather

than the mosaic as a whole. The ERASMUS+ Sport project “Gold in Education and Elite Sport”

(De Brandt et al., 2017; Wylleman, De Brandt, & Defruyt, 2017) provided a good overview of

student-athletes’ DC competencies integrated into several clusters (DC management, career

planning, mental toughness, social intelligence, and adaptability). However, when it comes to

environmental influences, research to date has mainly used the holistic athletic career model

(Wylleman et al., 2013) to consider factors related to the psychosocial level of athletes’

development (e.g., peers, coaches, teachers, DC support providers). By focusing mainly on the

individual student-athletes and their nearby significant others, contemporary European DC research

presents a one-sided story. From this vantage point, Stambulova and Wylleman (2019) identified a

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lack of “a whole environment” perspective as a major gap in European DC research and expressed

expectations that the ECO-DC project will be able bridge this gap through adopting the HEA.

The ECO-DC project invites researchers to look beyond the individual student-athlete and shift

their attention to exploring DCDEs. The initial step in the project was to create a taxonomy of

DCDEs, and eight types were identified across seven European countries involved in the project: (a)

sports-friendly schools, (b) elite sport schools /colleges, (c) professional and /or private club

programmes, (d) sports-friendly universities, (e) combined DC systems, (f) national sports

programmes, (g) defence forces programmes, and (h) players’ union programmes with a range of

approaches to supporting DCs (Cartigny et al., under review). A natural extension of this work was

to explore these types of environments in more detail by conducting case studies informed by the

HEA after adapting it to include specific features of DCDEs.

The HEA and Ecological DC Frameworks

Developed during the last decade, the HEA embraces a definition of an athletic talent

development environment (ATDE), the ATDE and ESF (Environment Success Factors) working

models, a recommended research methodology, and principles to inform applied sport psychology

work (see more in Henriksen & Stambulova, 2017). The ECO-DC consortium¹ has utilised the two

original HEA working models and pilot research on DCDEs in Sweden (Linnér, Stambulova, &

Henriksen, 2017) as well as in Denmark, Switzerland and Poland (Kuettel, Christensen, Zysko, &

Hansen, 2018) to create HEA informed working models to study DCDEs (Figures 1 and 2).

[Please insert Figures 1 and 2 here]

Figure 1 presents the DCDE working model as a framework to describe a particular DCDE and

clarify the roles and functions of the different components and relations within the environment.

Similar to the ATDE model, student-athletes are at the centre of the model and the DCDE’s

structure has micro- and macro-levels, but as a new feature it considers three (instead of two in the

ATDE model) domains in athletes’ development, namely sport, studies and private life. The micro-

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level refers to the environment where the student-athletes spend a good deal of their daily life and is

characterized by direct communication and interactions. The macro-level refers to social settings,

which affect but do not contain the student-athletes. The sport domain covers the part of the

athletes’ environment that is directly related to sport, the study domain represents components

related to their study activities, and the private life domain refers to the other spheres of the student-

athletes’ lives. Directly surrounding the young athletes are those closest to them, namely their study

peers, family and friends, as well as their club environment. Other components include related

teams and clubs, study programmes, and residence (at the micro-level), as well as sport systems, the

educational system and local authority (at the macro-level). The macro-environment also involves

various cultural contexts, such as national culture, sports culture and study culture. To illustrate the

permeability and interplay of the different components, these are marked by dotted lines. The outer

layer of the model outlines the past, present, and future of the DCDE, emphasizing its dynamic

nature.

Figure 2 presents the dual career environment success factors (DC-ESF) working model that

serves to summarize the factors that explain the environment’s effectiveness. Taking inspiration

from the ESF model, the DC-ESF considers the environment’s preconditions and processes in terms

of influencing DC philosophy and various student-athletes’ developments/achievements that

together indicate the DCDE’s effectiveness. The preconditions include financial and human

resources (e.g. coaches, experts) and facilities. The model then illustrates how the daily routines

(processes), designed in accordance with the philosophy of the DC support team, affect the student-

athletes’ development as athletes, students and people, and impact on their DC competencies. The

philosophy of the DC support team is central to the DC-ESF model and describes an integrated set

of key ideas and values about how DC support should be organized to provide conditions that are as

favourable as possible for student-athletes’ development, thus ensuring the DCDE’s effectiveness

as reflected in the student-athletes’ athletic and academic achievements, wellbeing and satisfaction.

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 The European Commission (2007; 2012) promotes sport participation in a socially responsible

manner implying athletes’ readiness for the post-sport career. A shift in focus from individual

student-athletes to their whole environments facilitates a richer understanding of the DC athletes’

challenges and coping processes in the societies that acknowledge their moral and social obligations

to help their athletes prepare for a life after sport (Stambulova & Wylleman, 2019). Due to the

relatively unexplored nature of the field, the current project has an exploratory rather than a

confirmatory design, or in the words of Bronfenbrenner (2005), it is in the discovery mode rather

than in the verification mode. With an overall aim to develop and implement a theory-driven

framework for the holistic ecological study of DCDEs in sport, we used the DCDE and the DC-ESF

working models to guide data collection, analysis and presentation of the findings (in the form of

relevant empirical models) in order to achieve two objectives: (a) to provide a holistic description of

a Danish athlete friendly university as a DCDE, and (b) to investigate the factors influencing the

environment’s effectiveness in supporting the development of student-athletes.

Methodology

The present study takes a contemporary and real-time view of the functioning of one Danish

DCDE called Aarhus University Elitesport (hereafter – AU Elitesport). We selected a case study

design (Hodge & Sharp, 2016) to explore the uniqueness and complexity of a specific bounded case

from multiple perspectives. More specifically, we considered AU Elitesport an instrumental case in

the sense that we explored the case in depth, but the case mainly played a supportive role for the

aim of exploring the applicability of the HEA to the study of a DCDE. We positioned this study

within a realist ontology (DCDEs exist as material structures that operate independently of our

experience) and a post-positivist epistemology (we strive for an accurate portrait of the DCDE

using a mix of appropriate methods but acknowledge that it can only be grasped imperfectly; Smith,

2019; McGannon, Smith, Kendellen, & Gonasalves, 2019). Following the HEA, we used the DCDE

and the DC-ESF working models as a lens to facilitate analysis and understanding of AU Elitesport

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by means of transforming the working models into empirical DCDE and DC-ESF models grounded

in the empirical data (Henriksen & Stambulova, 2017).

Danish DC Context

In Denmark, the combination of sport and studies is considered as a key ingredient of the life of

an elite athlete and not as a barrier to sporting achievements (Christensen & Soerensen, 2013;

Henriksen & Christensen, 2013). At the Olympic Games in 2016, student-athletes made up 38% of

the Danish Olympic team, winning 12 of the 15 Danish medals (Bundgaard, 2016). Danish DCDEs

are usually embedded within the regular educational institutions as athlete friendly (i.e. flexible)

systems. Education is open and generally free of charge. All students over the age of 18 are entitled

to a student grant to support their further education, and this grant is a motivating factor for Danish

athletes to continue on the DC pathway (Kuettel et al., 2018).

Case Selection and Ethics

AU Elitesport is an athlete friendly university setup (Cartigny et al., under review) located in

Aarhus, Denmark’s second-largest city. Since 2011, this DCDE has provided support services for

elite student-athletes representing 42 different sports and 51 different educational programmes.

Currently most student-athletes represent handball, sailing, football, orienteering and track and

field, and they study medicine, business economics, law, engineering and sports science. The main

reasons for selecting this DCDE were (a) eight-year experience of providing DC support as an

indicator of being an established and “mature” environment, (b) the increasing number of student-

athletes involved (from 60 to 290 over seven years with a low dropout rate), and (c) the willingness

of the stakeholders to provide detailed insights into the environment’s DC practice. Preliminary

information about the AU Elitesport was obtained through studying available public documents

(e.g., its website). Then, the head of the DC support team was contacted and informed about the aim

of the study, procedure and ethical issues, and more information about the environment was

obtained from them. The invitation on behalf of the research team to become the DCDE under this

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study was communicated to, and accepted by, the head of the DC support team. In further

discussion of the ethical issues, it was decided to keep the name of the environment open but to

anonymize all the participants involved (e.g. student-athletes, coaches, teachers, DC support

provides). The research team followed national ethical standards in order to ensure the protection of

the participants’ privacy. However, we were aware that contextual details might enable a few

insiders to recognize some participants; this possibility was discussed with the most “visible”

DCDE stakeholders and accepted.

Data Collection: Participants, Instruments, and Procedures

An overview of the data collection is presented in Table 1. Data collection methods contained

observation (including guided walks in the environment and informal brief interviews), semi-

structured interviews with various stakeholders, and analysis of documents. The observation and

interview guides (inspired by the HEA and informed by the DCDE and the DC-ESF working

models) were created by the consortium of the ECO-DC project.

[Please insert Table 1 here]

We obtained in situ observations (Thorpe & Olive, 2016) of approximately 50 hours of

everyday activities over three months, including life in the DC support offices, advice sessions,

meetings and guided walks. The principle researcher (the second author) explained her role as an

observer and invited DC stakeholders to communicate. The head of the DC support team and the

coaches provided the observer with tours of the university and sport centres respectively. During

these guided walks (Seanor, Schinke, Stambulova, Henriksen, Ross, & Giffin, 2019), visually

identified elements of the context triggered mobile conversations and prompted the guides to

recollect details and stories that otherwise could not been told. The observations gave the principle

researcher a profound feel for the environment and for what was valued (Krane & Baird, 2005) and

provided a solid basis for the interviews. During the observations, the principal researcher took an

active part in various meetings and contributed with advice and reflections. The observations

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focused mainly on the interactions, communication and relationships between the key DCDE

stakeholders (student-athletes, DC support providers, teachers, coaches, administrators) across

different activities and situations. The observer jotted down the field impressions and then

converted them into full notes.

The interview participants were two student-athletes, two coaches, one teacher, the two DC

support providers and the Vice-Chancellor of the university. A Team Denmark representative

helped us recruit athletes and coaches who represented the main sports and educational programs of

the DCDE and had used the services extensively. The head of the DC support team helped us

recruit a teacher who had extensive experience teaching student-athletes, and was very helpful in

establishing contact with interviewees and stimulating them to accept our invitation. The principle

researcher contacted the interviewees by e-mail and provided them with information about the

project, aim of the study and their rights (e.g. hidden identity, drop out at any time). Prior to the

interviews (see more about timing and places in Table 1), informed consent was received from the

interviewees. All interviews were structured in four parts. In the introductory part, we asked about

the interviewees’ background, function and their overall impression of the DCDE (e.g., What is

your role? What are the main challenges that you face? Do you consider this a good DCDE?). In the

second part, which aimed to outline the structure of the DCDE and was derived mainly from the

DCDE working model, we asked the participants to describe the roles and functions of specific

components of the environment, as well as the relationships between these components at the

micro- and macro-levels (e.g., Whom do you consider to be key persons in the student-athletes’

efforts to combine sport, study, and private life? What are the main roles of these people and how

do they collaborate?). In the third and explanatory part, derived mainly from the DC-ESF working

model, we asked the participants to comment on the preconditions, processes and DC philosophy of

the environment, as well as the student-athletes’ acquisition of personal and DC competencies (e.g.,

What are specific activities and services in this DCDE set in place to support the student-athletes’

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DCs? What values guide you in your daily work?). In the final part, we asked the participants to

reflect on the environment in the time frame and to describe good traditions, future challenges, and

ideas (e.g., What future challenges do you foresee? What can be done to improve this

environment?). Interview guides were adapted to the role of each participant to allow for their

particular perspective with the DCDE. For example, interviews with student-athletes mainly

focused on their DC experiences with an emphasis on the micro-environment, the processes, and

the facilitators and barriers that they encountered. Interviews with the DC support providers were

more comprehensive and focused, among other things, on the macro-level, preconditions, and

philosophy. Coaches and teachers based their reflections on their unique perspective of being in a

specific domain. All interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. Then, interview

participants received the transcripts to reflect upon, and only one suggested minor changes.

Analysis of documents was initially carried out to prepare researchers for the first visit to the

AU Elitesport and then continued throughout the whole study period to facilitate understanding of

the environment. The documents included: the website, social media, pictures, posters, individual

study plans, and reports on the student-athletes’ academic achievements and drop-out.

Data Analysis, Rigour, and the Research Team

Data collection and analysis were intertwined in a cyclical process that involved receiving

data, the working models, writing summaries, and our interpretations (Maaloe, 2006) with the aim

of creating the two empirical models – the AU Elitesport DCDE and the AU Elitesport DC-ESF –

grounded in the data. The data (interview transcripts, observation notes, and documentary extracts)

were analysed using thematic analysis (TA) drawing on the six steps outlined by Braun, Clarke, and

Weate (2016). Importantly, and in line with our post-positivist stance, we did not use reflexive TA

but rather used a coding reliability TA approach, conceptualized themes as data domains, and used

a pre-designed coding frame (Braun & Clarke, 2019). The first step consisted of transcribing, and

then reading and re-reading the data in order to familiarize ourselves with it. In the second and third

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steps, the principle researcher coded the data from a deductive-inductive perspective. In the initial

deductive coding, the data were categorized into higher-order themes (summaries of the range of

meanings related to each domain using all three data sources) derived from the DCDE and the DC-

ESF working models (e.g., sports domain micro- and macro-levels in relation to the DCDE model;

preconditions and DC competencies in relation to the DC-ESF model). The description of the

overall structure and resources of the DCDE relied mainly on document analysis and interviews,

whereas the descriptions of DC processes, DC philosophy, and athletes’ development relied on a

mix of observations and interviews. In the subsequent inductive coding, lower-order themes were

generated to describe major components and relationships to be further included in the AU

Elitesport DCDE empirical model (e.g. DC athletes and DC support team relationship) and in the

AU Elitesport DC-ESF empirical model (e.g. personal study plan, coordination, networking, etc. in

the DC processes). The fourth and fifth steps involved an iterative process, going back and forth

between the different types of data, the themes and the working models in order to construct the

empirical models. The principle researcher drafted the preliminary summary of the case and initial

versions of two empirical models. These versions looked overloaded with details and needed

refinement aimed at making the empirical models comprehensive enough but also not too “heavy”.

After discussions among the first and second authors with a focus on how to present an accurate

picture of the AU Elitesport DCDE, the first author drafted refined versions of the models and

relevant descriptions. The author team acted as critical friends (with an aim to enhance not only

accuracy but also dialogue about analytic choices; McGannon, Smith, Kendellen, & Gonsalves,

2019). More specifically, co-authors discussed the models with a focus on comprehensibility and

alignment between the data, models, and descriptions, resulting in a third version of both the DCDE

and the DC-ESF. To enhance trustworthiness, we engaged in synthesized member checking

(McGannon et al., 2019), by sharing the final empirical models with head of the AU Elitesport DC

support team to establish the degree with which our portrait resonated with him. We asked him to

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reflect upon and challenge the empirical models and the case summary. He suggested an addition to

the DCDE model, which was to clarify the position of the study boards, but also shared that he

considered the presentation to be a trustworthy portrayal of the DCDE. The sixth step included

writing the final presentation of the findings.

The research team consists of experienced researchers within the fields of talent and career

development and represent multiple perspectives, including four nationalities, two universities,

male and female, and personal histories as elite and student-athletes. The first and second author

were responsible for the study, and the second author collected and coded the data. Other authors

used their DC knowledge and status as cultural outsiders to provide additional interpretations and

insights. In the early phase, they provided ideas for the interview and observation guides. In the data

collection phase during preliminary case presentations, they suggested areas for additional scrutiny

based on their experience with other DCDEs and DC research. In the process of developing the

empirical models, they challenged the models’ accuracy and comprehensibility and suggested

clarifications (Smith & McGannon, 2017).

Findings

Below we present findings of the study as they are summarized in two empirical models.

Firstly, we introduce the empirical AU Elitesport DCDE model that describes the major

components and structure of this environment. Then we present the empirical AU Elitesport DC-

ESF model that describes and structures factors contributing to environment effectiveness in

supporting student-athletes in their DC pursuits.

Introducing the AU Elitesport DCDE

In order to be accepted as a student-athlete at AU Elitesport, athletes must be at the highest

national or international elite level in their sports. The level criteria are operationalized differently

in different sports, and coaches help in the assessment of the athletes’ applications. This DCDE is

not situated in one specific location, and the athletes do not necessarily meet or know each other.

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Instead, the student-athletes are part of a virtual community bound by shared narratives. However,

support is provided mainly in two DC support team offices at the central university campus and at

the sport science department closer to the training facilities of several sports.

The offices are small and cosy and filled with artefacts, such as t-shirts and “thank-you-cards”

from athletes. There are desks, a meeting round table with chairs in the center of the room, and

a couch. There are many pictures of the student-athletes in sports situations. There are boards

with the study results of AU Elitesport, and information confirming low drop-out of the

student-athletes and low unemployment of the graduates. At the pin-up board there is a private

photo of the head of DC together with an Olympic medalist, group pictures of student-athletes

from the annual celebration ceremony, front pages of Danish sports magazines, and the

working models from this ECO-DC project. AU Elitesport has its own homepage and is visible

on different social media platforms (from observation notes).

The Empirical AU Elitesport DCDE Model

Figure 3 shows the empirical AU Elitesport DCDE model constructed from the data using the

DCDE working model as a lens. Bearing in mind that all the components of the DCDE are

interconnected and affect one another, the model depicts the most important components and

relationships as well as the structure of the focal environment.

[Please insert Figure 3 here]

Central axis: Student-athletes and the DC support team. The core of the environment was a

strong relationship between a heterogeneous group of student-athletes and the DC support team.

The student-athletes valued the support as a key ingredient in their successful combination of sport

and studies. The relationship was described as a strong, personal, and key connector between the

sport and study domains. A DC sailor explained:

I write to the DC support team if I cannot attend an exam, or if I need support to talk with

my teachers. I remember a teacher, who didn’t want lectures to be video filmed. The DC

13
 team talked to him and found a solution. I also remember a written exam I could not attend.

Normally, I would have to attend the re-examination, but this collided with the world

championship. They arranged an extraordinary oral exam for me on a date I selected myself.

The DC support team built relationships with every individual athlete. The significance of the

personal connection was underscored by an absence of formal brochures and written information.

The head of the DC support team explained: “We don’t have such material because we help the

athletes in so many different ways that I would not know what to write”. The environment was

characterized by many personal relationships, and communication was most often face-to-face or by

phone. The DC support team emphasized that they deliberately considered the student-athletes, first

and foremost, as athletes because everybody else in the university system meets them as students.

The DC support team consisted of the head of the team, a full-time support provider, and a

part-time support provider. They collaborated closely and openly, and they discussed critical cases

in order to agree on solutions. The team’s overall function was to make the combination of elite

sport and higher education both possible and efficient. To accomplish this, the team advised

potential student-athletes during the application process and thus minimized the number of rejected

applications, educated enrolled student-athletes about the laws and logic of the university system,

advised on individual study plans to facilitate approval of these plans by a study board, and finally,

aimed to stimulate a feeling of being a part of the student-athlete community.

The DC support team saw their role as changing through three distinct phases over a student-

athlete’s career. These phases were not formalized but rather a shared construction that allowed the

team to make overall plans and prioritize their services. In the pre-university phase, the team

advocated that the combination of elite sport and higher education is indeed possible. When

accepted at AU Elitesport, student-athletes entered the DC adaptation phase, which typically

covered the first year at the university. The DC support team considered this first year to be the

14
most critical phase, and therefore took a proactive role by inviting each student-athlete for an intake

interview.

We observed a meeting where a new student was overwhelmed when she started her study

and was unable to find a foothold in the new situation. The meeting covered personal

ambitions, barriers, opportunities, and it was pointed out that being overwhelmed is normal at

this phase. The support provider arranged a follow-up meeting (from observation notes).

From the second year at the university, the student-athletes entered the DC continuation phase

characterized by the formation of a sense of belonging to the AU Elitesport environment, stabilizing

their identity as student-athletes, and increased satisfaction and well-being. In this phase, the DC

support team took a more reactive perspective in responding to the student-athletes’ requests.

Having such phase-like structure in mind, the DC support team is able to pay attention and support

every student-athlete but to a different degree depending on their current phase and related needs.

The DC support team and the sport domain. The micro-environment in the sports domain

involved mainly coaches and sport peers. The role and involvement of coaches varied for different

sports and athletes, but the coaches were generally supportive and for their part willing to allow

some flexibility. As explained by a DC sailor: “My coach makes it possible for me, because he

accepts that I sometimes have to adapt training to fit school. For example, I can come to a camp a

day later if I have an exam or similar.” Supportive coaches made the athletes feel safer, and in the

best cases the DC support team and coaches met up and discussed the DC plans (e.g., that a sailor

can study more in the first year after the Olympic Games but needs to focus more on sailing when

the Games approach again). The coaches highlighted that they were always welcome to call the DC

support team, and some sports invited the head of the DC support team to stop by a training camp

and talk to the athletes. After one such visit, the orienteering national team coach reflected:

It is crucial that the individual athletes create their own study plans. They should not strive to

do what others have done. They each have special situations. They should know from the

15
 beginning that they have to find their own way. I always support this view in communication

with my athletes.

The DC support team advised the student-athletes to invest time in making a good start as a

university student (i.e. to build relationships with their study peers and get a feeling for what it takes

to study at the university). This was often, at least for a short time, at the expense of their sport, but

seen as a sound investment. The national team coach explained how he supported this view to help

his athletes take the advice seriously:

We agree that a good start is very important… We help them to make a good start and build

relationships with their peers. They need help from their fellow students, and they also

benefit from having social network, in which they really thrive and have friends. So, [when

they begin at the university] I lower my demands on their training for a while.

The sport peers’ roles and functions in regard to the student-athletes’ DC varied. Some peers

supported the DC engagement, while others described it as a lack of sporting ambition. This was

something that the student-athletes discussed with the DC support providers. It was noticeable that

the role of sport peers differs from sport to sport. In the case of sailing and orienteering (that are

strong elite sports environments in Aarhus with a positive attitude towards DC), most sports peers

are student-athletes themselves. At training camps in these sports, study time is scheduled. On the

contrary, the DC support provider shared a unique situation of a football player who had very few

DC peers in his football team, and therefore lacked peer support. In discussion with the player, the

DC support provider emphasized that he might become a DC role model for his teammates by

showing that combining football and studies is possible.

In the macro-environment, the local and national sport networks were well-established and

organized in the city of Aarhus, and the head of the DC support team was invited to be at several

positions and boards. This enabled the creation of multiple links between the micro- and macro-

levels. From an individual student-athlete’s perspective, some of these networks were macro-level

16
(e.g. local sports organizations and Team Denmark), whereas others were micro-level (e.g., a

regional centre). As part of the macro-environment, Team Denmark (TD) provided financial

support for the setup and had an ongoing dialogue with the DC support team about individual

athletes and current trends. Some student-athletes (i.e., top level performers) would contact TD

first, when they needed help, and a solution would be found between TD, the student-athlete, and

the DC support team. The collaboration with TD gave legitimacy to the DC support team, reduced

their workload through shared support, and contributed to positive DC narratives at the university.

As explained by the head of the DC support team: “The TD director recognizes us and is a member

of our advisory board. I believe that we have a shared understanding [of student-athletes’

challenges] and DC philosophy.”

The DC support team and the study domain. At the micro-level, good relationships with

study peers (i.e., regular students) were important to the student-athletes for several reasons. Firstly,

the regular students helped keep the student-athletes updated and involved in study groups and

group-based project work, even when they were absent with their sport. A world-class sailor, whose

sport involves him travelling for around 200 days per year, acknowledged this help:

The biggest challenge for me is that I can’t attend all classes. I miss important information

about homework and assignments. My study peers make it much easier for me. They record

lectures and take notes. You should not underestimate the value of good relationships with

your study peers, and it is difficult for those who do not prioritize their study networks.

Secondly, and bordering on the private domain, the peers became good friends and provided

emotional support. A DC handball player explained how she valued being seen as a person and not

just an athlete: “The day after I performed poorly in a match, one of my study friends brought a

cake to the class. It was no longer all about the match. I felt we care about each other. I can be me.”

Teachers needed to show a high degree of flexibility to accommodate the student-athletes’

needs, (e.g., giving an extra lecture or sending out a course programme in advance). It was the

17
student-athletes’ own responsibility to inform their teachers and ask for flexible study solutions.

Some teachers found this onerous, but they were obliged by the law to care for students with special

needs. The teacher (the one interviewed), who also led the clinical educational programme, shared

that she often reminded colleagues of this obligation before a student-athlete approached them, and

concluded: “Most often I find they are positive and willing to help”. As a result, the DC support

team rarely contacted teachers directly.

The macro-environment contains study boards and their relationships with the DC support

team. The study boards are collegial bodies with a set of tasks, according to the university

legislation, related to the planning and development of courses and teaching, including, for

example, approving or rejecting study plans and applications. The student-athletes applied

themselves for flexible study plans, but the DC support team helped them to write high-quality

applications that would not be rejected by the study boards. Different study boards (for the various

courses) had different procedures, and experience with these various procedures as well as formal

and informal relationships within the university system was important for the DC support team to

be effective. For example, during guided walks we observed that the head of the DC support team

had a large informal network; he said hello to everybody by name, and we got the impression that

he knew everybody and everybody knew him. In its work with colleagues, the DC support team

made an effort to sustain good narratives about what education means to athletes’ well-being,

whereby they motivated their colleagues to help. During the guided walk, the head of the DC

support team explained: “There are many people in the background whom the athletes never meet.

But they all meet us. We are the link”.

The private domain. At the micro-level, family and friends were important for the student-

athletes. They provided a secure space to air dreams and frustrations. However, the role of family

and friends regarding the DC was limited. A DC sailor explained: “We travel a lot, so the home-

base is important. Sometimes everything is just a little too much, and I visit my family and friends

18
to wind down. I have even postponed an exam to find time for this.” A DC handball player

supported this view: “I have learnt I need to allow myself to just be a person, to have dinner with

my parents, or go to a party with friends. Earlier in my career I was too focused on sport and not

happy”. In the adaptation phase, parents were typically involved more in discussing what study

programme to select and in helping the athletes to settle in a new town.

On the macro-level, the local authority supported the athletes’ endeavours by providing cheap

living quarters in close proximity to the university and by supporting local sport clubs through

cheap rents for training facilities.

Macro-cultural influences. The macro-cultures particularly influential in AU Elitesport were

the Danish educational, youth and sport performance cultures. Education is freely available, and is

seen as the “norm”, even for athletes. The university Vice-Chancellor explained: “Athletes

contribute to the study environment and to the diversity of the student population, which we really

value.” The youth and sport performance cultures, on the other hand, are challenging for DCs.

Young people in Denmark are often ambitious and perfectionistic, aiming for high grades at school

and top performances in sport. We see this as a reflection of an overarching performance culture.

Consequences of this include a risk of the student-athletes suffering from high levels of pressure,

insufficient recovery time and poor mental health.

Environment in the time frame. The time frame depicts an ongoing development of the DC

support team from a pioneer unit to a recognized part of the central setup. By 2016, the DC support

team had become a permanent unit at the university under the central study administration. This

was a landmark event that symbolized recognition of the team’s work and provided legitimacy and

stability. The head of DC support team reflected on the globalization of sport and saw it as one of

the future challenges. It is the DC team’s vision to further enhance study flexibility, so that student-

athletes are able to take exams while being on training camps or competitions abroad. They further

expect an increase in number of student-athletes, which will require an expansion the DC support

19
team and improved peer mentorship. The Vice-Chancellor reflected on the development of the

society and saw other areas beyond sport to be new DC fields, for example, entrepreneurship. She

relied on the AU Elitesport in helping to develop a DC support team for entrepreneurship students.

In spite of the obvious achievements, the AU Elitesport DC support team recognizes some future

challenges (e.g., recruiting new professional staff to support a growing amount of DC athletes).

The Empirical AU Elitesport DC-ESF Model

Figure 4 presents the empirical version of the DC-ESF model, summarizing the DCDE

preconditions, processes and DC philosophy as the most important factors influencing the student-

athletes’ development and success of AU Elitesport as a DCDE.

[Please insert Figure 4 here]

DCDE preconditions. The status as a permanent unit provides the stability needed for the

team to do long-term planning in order to support student-athletes. The team has its own budget for

salaries and activities. It also has one office in the central study administration building and another

one at the department of sports sciences, thus enabling the team to be flexible and meet student-

athletes in close proximity to their activities. In order to keep student-athletes motivated and

develop the positive attitudes of the people within the DCDE with regard to DCs, the DC support

team disseminated narratives about successful DCs and information about the support available.

These narratives also paved the way for DC processes and could be seen as a DCDE resource.

Meanwhile, the DCDE relied on the sports to provide their own training, training facilities and

expert services which could be seen as a barrier to arranging smooth transitions between different

activities carried out by the student-athletes.

DC processes. The core task for the DC support team was to provide individual advice or

mentorship to student-athletes. Their individual study plans were always considered as preliminary,

and recreated several times during the educational period because of changes in the sport situation.

Each change in the study plan needed formal approval, and the DC support team informed the study

20
boards in advance. A DC orienteer commented: “I send an application to the study board. They

knew it was coming, so the process was very swift”. The head and members of the DC support team

used their professional and personal networks to ensure coordination within AU Elitesport and links

with the external partners. For example, the DC support team met regularly with representatives of

upper secondary schools, sport clubs and networks in the local community as well as national sports

federations in order to promote DC opportunities and create goodwill. In some cases, the DC

support team arranged study-buddies (as paid employment for a peer) to help a student-athlete by

taking notes from classes. Finally, an annual graduation event for student-athletes was arranged by

the Vice-Chancellor, who saw the student-athletes as an important brand for the university.

DC Philosophy. The DC support team shared a strong DC philosophy that in our analysis

consisted of four interconnected assumptions that guided the team’s work.

Flexible solutions for individual athletes. The core of the philosophy revolved around the idea

that athletes are different, and therefore the team had to find flexible solutions and create an

individual study plan for each athlete. As explained by the head of the DC support team:

It is a mantra for us to say that there is no single solution. You [the athlete] must find the

solution that best fits you. Clearly, we have experience and see multiple solutions, and the

student-athletes are often surprised by the number solutions available to them. However, in the

end it is their choice.

A visible trend in all the observed meetings between student-athletes and support providers

was that the providers told many DC stories based on the experiences of earlier athletes. These

stories created a shared narrative that enabled current student-athletes to feel they belonged to the

student-athletes’ community. Because the student-athletes rarely met with each other, these

narratives had a central position in the environment as a kind of “social glue”.

Sport comes first. The DC support office is full of pictures and posters of Danish elite athletes

from various sports. There is a consensus in the AU Elitesport DCDE that sport comes first. A

21
national team coach confirmed: “The athletes travel a lot and train twice a day. Training must be

planned to allow quality recovery. It is not a solution to let studies be a dominating focus.” Other

people in the DCDE supported the idea and willingly worked to find study solutions that allowed

the best possible conditions for the sport.

Finding an optimal balance is a process. Finding an optimal balance is seen as an ongoing

process that never truly ends, because the circumstances evolve. The student-athletes’ endeavour to

balance (not just combine) sport, studies and private life required integrated efforts and

understanding, and the DC support team was willing to help. However, the student-athletes were

expected to take initiative and be the main drivers of the process. A DC sailor gave an example:

I would hate to hand in an assignment and go to a competition, and to have poor results in both.

Two times mediocre does not equal to even one good result. So, I talked to DC support to

postpone my bachelor’s exam. They supported me, but it was my decision.

Athletes are more than athletes. An athlete’s career is long, has ups and downs, and carries

no guarantee of success. Therefore, it is seen as important in the AU Elitesport environment that

student-athletes perceive themselves to be more than athletes, and the same is true of how the DC

support team perceives them. A DC handball player explained: “I have realized that not having

something beyond handball does not work for me”, and a DC sailor reflected on how a wider focus

was a resource in a sport where it takes many years to reach the world elite level: “When I struggle

in my sport, I still have another aspect of life running in parallel, where I can find lots of joy. It

makes it easier to handle tough periods and be patient.” A DC support provider added that athletes

who are also students become less vulnerable “if for some reason the sport doesn’t work out”.

Student-athletes’ development as athletes, students and people. By gradually changing their

role from proactively contacting the student-athletes to helping them on request (see above), the DC

support team helped the student-athletes develop autonomy and responsibility for creating a

balanced life. For example, the DC support team provided new student-athletes with extensive help

22
in writing applications for the study board but offered only a feedback to the more experienced

student-athletes on their near-finished applications. Gradually, the student-athletes took more

initiative (e.g., by contacting the DC support team when they needed experts’ support or by warning

teachers of their forthcoming training camps) and became drivers of their DCs. In doing so, they

matured as students, athletes, and persons. The head of the DC support team described it as

development at the existential level:

They are different persons when they graduate. [I mean: they are] more responsible, more

mature. They learn to ask themselves: “Where do I want to go with my sport, education and

life, and what steps must I take to get there?”

Student-athletes’ DC competencies. Three DC competencies were prioritized for

development in this environment. The first – prioritizing and planning – was seen as absolutely

crucial to the creation of a coherent everyday life. As explained by a DC handball player:

Everything goes through me, which suits me well even if it is stressful at times. You know, you

talk to the coach and agree to change something in relation to your studies and then you go to

the DC team and sometimes you have to get final approval from the coach. Of course, it is not

always easy, but it is my life, and I have surely developed some planning skills, which I

appreciate and which I would not have acquired without this DC adventure.

The second prioritized DC competency of student-athletes constituted social (e.g. relationship,

communication) skills. This was related to the student-athletes’ need to approach their study peers,

teachers and others in order to get (and provide) help and support. The DC support team would

encourage student-athletes to talk to specific people and help newcomers make initial contacts. The

third prioritized DC competency was “presence”, which referred to the student-athletes’ ability to

be in the present moment and focus on their sport when at training and on their studies when at the

university. The coaches explained that their athletes learned presence “through necessity”, and

some even honed it as a skill by training mindfulness with a sport psychology practitioner.

23
 DCDE effectiveness. When evaluating its effectiveness, the DC team referred to the student-

athletes winning medals and handling their education well. Statistics show that 20% of all Danish

medals at the 2016 Olympic Games were won by current AU Elitesport student-athletes. In

addition, they are efficient in the education system, as stated by the Vice-Chancellor:

In management, I look at the hard facts. I look at study credits per year, total time for the

education completion, and dropout rates. The numbers tell me that the student-athletes are

doing well and the AU Elitesport is a success.

Finally, the student-athletes and their coaches expressed satisfaction with the DC support provided

by the environment. A DC sailor who just got her bachelor’s degree reflected: “It is a big success. I

think that I would have given up on my education if I had not been supported”.

Discussion

The last decade has seen a considerable increase in DC research and a marked progression of

knowledge in the field (Guidotti, et al., 2015; Stambulova & Wylleman, 2019). This was achieved

mainly because athletes’ DCs have been a key strategic focus area of the European Commission and

their research programmes, especially after the EU DC Guidelines were issued (European

Commission, 2012). Most of this previous and current research has taken the individual and holistic

developmental perspectives and focused on DC pathways in different European countries, major

DC transitions and related challenges, DC competencies of student-athletes and DC support

providers, student-athletes’ mental health and well-being, etc. (for a review, see Stambulova &

Wylleman, 2019). This paper aims to supplement this body of DC literature with an ecological

approach, by presenting a case study of one Danish DCDE, which is AU Elitesport. We also use

this case study to prove the applicability of the HEA to exploring DCDEs.

In the area of talent development, the HEA with its two working models has shown its value

as a lens to aid the study of specific environments (Henriksen & Stambulova, 2017). Although

holistic in nature, this approach was not previously designed to study DCDEs. Therefore, based on

24
the two working models of the original HEA (i.e. the ATDE and the ESF models), we developed¹

the DCDE and DC-ESF working models. In the descriptive DCDE working model, the main change

compared with the prototype ATDE model was a revision of the environmental domains, focusing

on student-athletes’ sport, studies and private life. Although the school and further education

systems were included in the ATDE model, the addition of the study domain concentrated our focus

and stimulated us to look at the environment specifically as a DCDE. In the explanatory DC-ESF

working model, the main change compared to the ESF framework was a substitution of

organizational culture by a DC philosophy. The rationale for this change was that DCDEs are

typically composite environments that contain athletes from many subcultures (different sports and

study programmes), and are therefore unlikely to possess an integrated organizational culture of

their own. However, DC stakeholders in the environment work from a set of key ideas and

assumptions about the aim and nature of a successful DC support service, which we describe as a

DC philosophy. Another new component in the DC-ESF model is a more specific focus on the DC

competencies requested and acquired in the environment. Directing our attention to the structure,

components, processes and success factors of a DCDE, the two working models proved to be

helpful in the empirical investigation of a specific DCDE in Denmark. These models guided the

development of the observation and interview guides and facilitated the data analysis and

presentation of the AU Elitesport findings.

AU Elitesport as an Effective DCDE

Two empirical models of AU Elitesport (see Figures 3 and 4) enable us to provide the

following summary of the DCDE, which (a) is centred on a DC support team that serves to integrate

the sport and study domains and to some degree the private domain by supporting communication

and coordination between the different parts; (b) benefits from the DC support team’s placement as

a central unit in the university system and its strong ties with key sport organizations such as Team

Denmark, and the legitimacy from both the study and sport domain that comes with it; (c) is

25
dependent on the extensive but also informal network inside the university and local and national

sport systems of the head of the DC support team; (d) is focused on providing individual solutions

for each athlete and facilitating the athlete’s choice through stories of solutions that worked for

other student-athletes; (e) is virtual in the sense that the student-athletes may never meet, but the

stories create narrative resources that enable the student-athletes’ feelings to be a part of the

environment; (f) teaches student-athletes planning, prioritization and social skills and to be present

and autonomous and take responsibility for balance in their DC endeavour; and (g) is deeply rooted

in a shared DC philosophy that puts sport first, recognizes that finding a good balance is a process,

and that the student-athletes must be seen as whole persons. Although AU Elitesport is portrayed as

a successful DCDE, it faces some challenges. First, providing support to a large number of athletes,

the DC support team recognized they were under-staffed and needed to enlarge the DC support

team. We argue that the DCDE structure of the AU Elitesport seems underdeveloped because it

relies heavily on the head of DC support team, his personal network and his familiarity with the

athletes and coaches. This makes the whole set-up vulnerable if this person decides to leave his

position. Further, we argue that a key focus on the DC balance (within the shared DC philosophy)

was only possible because the sport domain (coaches and managers) recognized DC benefits for

athletes’ wellbeing and sport performance, which is also highlighted by Pink, Saunders, and Stynes

(2015) in a study of an Australian football club.

Based on the analysis of one successful DCDE (i.e. AU Elitesport), it is possible to see how

arrangements between sporting, educational and community stakeholders coordinated by the DC

support team are helpful for athletes to initiate and continue their DC pathway at the university.

Benefits for the student-athletes are seen on different levels. For example, full-time athletes, who

engage only in a sports career, are particularly at risk of athletic identity foreclosure (Brewer &

Petitpas, 2017), as they are lacking a support network outside of sport. This may lead to problems

when they retire from athletics and subsequently to poor mental health and burnout (Cecić Erpič,

26
Wylleman, & Zupančič, 2004; Kuettel, Boyle, & Schmid, 2017; Park, Lavallee, & Tod, 2013;

Sorkkila, Ryba, Aunola, Selänne, & Salmela-Aro, 2017). Engaging in a DC can ameliorate these

issues. Having an education not only provides enhanced employment prospects after an athlete’s

career is over and a safety net for athletes who are less successful in their sports, but also improves

lifestyle balance and social network, as well as providing intellectual stimulation (Debois et al.,

2015; Tekavc, Wylleman, & Cecić Erpič, 2015; Torregrossa et al., 2015). However, DCs also come

with specific challenges. These relate mainly to balancing sport, studies, and private life by making

changes to one’s priorities depending on the DC situation (e.g. prioritizing sport during periods of

competition, and education during exams) in order to be able to reduce unnecessary stress and

maintain health and wellbeing (Stambulova et al., 2015). To some degree, AU Elitesport helps the

student-athletes to deal with these challenges by providing flexible solutions adapted to the

individual, seeing the student-athletes as whole persons, helping them to develop DC competencies

and become more autonomous, and by creating the DC community for them to feel a part of. This

supports a current focus on autonomy supportive coaching (e.g., Conroy & Coatsworth, 2007;

Delrue, Soenens, Morbée, Vansteenkiste, & Haerens, 2019), and we suggest such an approach

could be a key to the successful practice of DC support providers.

All athletes are situated in environments with differing degrees of success in supporting their

DCs. Based on case studies of the ATDEs in multiple sports and countries (see Henriksen &

Stambulova, 2017, for a summary) the researchers concluded that although each environment was

unique, successful ATDEs also shared a number of features. These environments were most

successful when the efforts of different parts of the environment (e.g. school, club coaches, national

team coaches, parents, and others) were integrated rather than fragmented or in opposition, when

they involved proximal role models and inclusive training groups and when the organisational

culture of the ATDEs were characterized by coherence and contained values such as long-term

development focus, a broad sampling basis, and a holistic view of the athletes. Comparing features

27
of the AU Elitesport DCDE uncovered in this study to the features shared by successful ATDEs, we

can see several overlaps. Firstly, the DC support team helped to integrate DC support efforts by

establishing and coordinating communication between the different levels and domains of the

DCDE. Secondly, although AU Elitesport is a virtual environment, a number of circulating

narratives of successful DC solutions shared by the DC support team in many ways served the same

function as actual role models (i.e. inspiring the student-athletes to find a path and develop their

own solutions). Thirdly, although a DCDE does not have an organizational culture as such, a rooted

and shared DC philosophy served the same function by aligning the efforts of coaches, teachers,

and support providers and ensuring that the approach would be the same regardless of which DC

support provider helped the student-athletes. Future ecological DC research should involve more

case studies that embrace various types of DCDEs (Cartigny et al., under review), successful and

less successful, and in different countries in order to be able to proceed with a cross-case analysis

and create a list of shared features (similar to the successful ATDE) as a guide to DCDE

optimization. Initial steps in this direction are currently in progress within the ECO-DC project.

Methodological Reflections

Due to the relative lack of ecological approaches in DC research, the present study had an

exploratory design. In line with HEA, we used a case study approach, took a contemporary view of

the environment (not retrospective) and collected data from multiple sources. We found that by

directing our attention to the structure, components, processes, and success factors of a DCDE, the

two working models that were developed specifically for the study of DCDEs proved helpful in

designing interview/observation guides and analysing the data. Creating empirical versions of the

two working models provided a structure for the presentation of the findings and enabled us to

present the complex environment in a format that was easy to understand.

While statistical-probabilistic generalizability is not relevant in qualitative research, a strength

of the present instrumental case study is that it lends itself well to naturalistic and analytical

28
generalization (Smith, 2017). We believe the case itself will resonate with DC support providers

and offers novel insights and ideas to improve their practices (naturalistic generalization).

Additionally, we have provided concepts and theories (the working models) that can be of use in the

analysis of other DCDEs (analytical generalization).

Two limitations of the study are worth mentioning. Firstly, it is difficult to prove the

uniqueness of the environment since it is not possible to compare it with other environments studied

using the same approach. Secondly, although student-athletes experience challenges specifically

related to the sport, study, and private domains, from a DC perspective, challenges related to the

connection and shifts between these domains are of particular interest. We therefore recommend

that future investigations of DCDEs involve shadow observations. We imagine that a researcher

follows one or more athletes during a whole day with a particular focus on the shifts in domains.

Conclusion

DCDEs exist to support student-athletes in their endeavours to combine sport with education

or work. Such environments are likely to vary in their structure, processes, philosophy, and degree

of effectiveness. Understanding such environments and their success factors across different

contexts can contribute to a DC research that has so far mainly taken a holistic view of individual

student-athletes. Two contributions of the present study are worth highlighting. First, we identified

features that contributed to the success of AU Elitesport as a DCDE. These include an integration of

efforts across the sport, study and private domains, a dedicated DC support team with widespread

formal and informal networks inside sport and studies, a focus on individualized solutions and

teaching the student-athletes DC competencies, and a deeply rooted and shared philosophy. The

HEA stimulates the researcher-practitioner to focus not only on the challenges and coping strategies

of the individual student-athletes but to understand and (if necessary) to optimize the entire

environment around them. The in-depth description of AU Elitesport can serve as an inspiration in

these efforts. Second, and in line with considering AU Elitesport an instrumental case, we

29
confirmed that the HEA and the DCDE and DC-ESF working models are practical and useful for

DC stakeholders to increase their awareness, understanding and potentially optimization of their

DCDEs.

Author note:

¹ The working models used in this paper - the DCDE and the DC-ESF - constitute an

intellectual output of the Erasmus + Sports project “Ecology of Dual Career” (ECO-DC). The

authors of this paper are co-creators of the models and therefore have a copyright to use these

models (i.e., Figures 1 and 2) in this and further publications.

Acknowledgements (will be added).

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Figure Captions

Figure 1: The dual career development environment (DCDE) working model

Figure 2: The dual career environment success factors (DC-ESF) working model

Figure 3: The DCDE empirical model of AU Elitesport

Figure 4: The DC-ESF empirical model of AU Elitesport

Table 1
Overview of Data Collection at the AU Elitesport DCDE

Observations and Guided Walks

Place Activities observed Informal interviews
At the University Advice sessions with 5 student-athletes from weightlifting,
student-athletes sailing orienteering, and triathlon, studying
Meetings law, agro-biology, history, machine
Everyday interactions engineering and odontology
Employees
The founder and former Dean
At Elite Sport Centre Training Physical fitness coach
Office-activity Sports manager, Dance Sports federation

At Aarhus International Sailing Training 2 student-athlete sailors

Centre (AISC) Meetings

Semi-Structured Interviews
Interviewee Time Place
Head of DC support team 3 hours University office
DC support provider 85 minutes University office
Student-athlete; sailing, sport science 45 minutes Skype
Student-athlete; handball, 55 minutes University
engineering.
National team coach, orienteering 65 minutes Elite sport centre
Head of talent development, sailing 90 minutes AISC
Teacher, odontology 38 minutes University office
Vice-Chancellor 20 minutes University office
Documents Analysis

The website, social media, pictures, posters, individual study plans, and reports on the student-athletes
‘academic achievements and drop-out.

36
 Highlights

• This study is a part of the Erasmus+ Sports project “Ecology of Dual Career”

• It applies the holistic ecological approach to the study of dual careers

• It introduces the dual career development environment (DCDE) and two working models

• Explores a Danish university DCDE by transforming working models to empirical models

• Stimulates readers to consider the role of environment in athletes’ dual careers

Author statement

We hereby declare that all persons who meet authorship criteria are listed as authors, and
that all authors on the list have participated sufficiently in the work to take public
responsibility for the content. This includes participation in the concept, design, analysis,
writing, and revision of the manuscript.

Furthermore, each author certifies that this material or similar material has not been and will
not be submitted to or published in any other publication before its appearance in Psychology
of Sport and Exercise

On behalf of the authors

Kristoffer Henriksen
Declarations of interest: None