{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,7]],"date-time":"2026-08-07T14:25:42Z","timestamp":1786112742329,"version":"build-2736575974"},"reference-count":38,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,3]],"date-time":"2026-08-03T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1785715200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Psychol."],"abstract":"<jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Introduction<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Training avoidance in sport is often interpreted through a deficit lens, yet little is known about how athletes regulate participation when leaving a team is institutionally costly. This study examined training avoidance within Chinese college football as a form of constrained participation.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Methods<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 Chinese college football student-athletes, all admitted through the Sports Special Admission policy. Data were analyzed using Straussian grounded theory procedures, including iterative theoretical sampling, constant comparison, open, axial, and selective coding, and negative-case analysis.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>The analysis generated Navigating Constrained Training Participation as the core category. Four causal conditions shaped training avoidance: Status Marginalization Pressure, Inter-Role Conflict, Informal Power Oppression, and Asymmetrical Rule Enforcement. Athletes responded through a flexible, context-dependent repertoire of Covert Energy Conservation, Psychological Defense, Legitimation Maneuvering, and Overt Resistance. These strategies were not a fixed progression; athletes combined, revisited, or abandoned them as perceived risk, bodily capacity, available justifications, and coach relations changed. The process provided short-term protection while potentially contributing to longer-term erosion of skill, belonging, and participation.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Discussion<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Training avoidance is better understood not as an individual moral deficit but as a systemically produced and structurally conditioned adaptation. The model clarifies how athletes exercise constrained agency and offers a transferable explanation for sport-education systems in which exit is costly and participation is tied to educational opportunities, grading, resources, or status.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.3389\/fpsyg.2026.1904154","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,3]],"date-time":"2026-08-03T04:27:33Z","timestamp":1785731253000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Navigating constrained training participation: a grounded theory of training avoidance among Chinese college football student-athletes"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Yangjia","family":"Xiong","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Physical Education, Huaqiao University, Quanzhou","place":["Fujian Province, China"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Minghan","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Physical Education, Huaqiao University, Quanzhou","place":["Fujian Province, China"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Xingyuan","family":"Song","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Physical Education, Yunnan Minzu University, Kunming","place":["Yunnan Province, China"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ying","family":"Chen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Physical Education, Huaqiao University, Quanzhou","place":["Fujian Province, China"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,3]]},"reference":[{"key":"B1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"75","DOI":"10.1123\/jsep.33.1.75","article-title":"Psychological need thwarting in the sport context: assessing the darker side of athletic experience","volume":"33","author":"Bartholomew","year":"2011","journal-title":"J. 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