Leaving elite sport, abandoning athletic identity? Development and predictors of athletic identity post-retirement

The purpose of this study was to examine how athletic identity develops beyond a career in elite sport and which factors contribute to this development. A two-wave 12-year longitudinal survey of 290 Swiss elite athletes (M_age = 36.8 years at t₂; 32.8% women, 67.2% men; 63% individual sports, 37% team sports athletes) was conducted during (t₁) and after their career (t₂). Multilevel models revealed that athletic identity was high at t₁ and decreased over time. However, there was considerable heterogeneity across athletes. Particularly, the status as an athlete (i.e., professional vs. semi-professional), career age, and self-complexity predicted athletic identity at t₁. A slower decline in athletic identity was found for athletes who earned their living in sports, participated in (recreational) competitive sport, were satisfied with their sport career, and did not increase their self-complexity at t₂. Therefore, when seeking to reduce athletic identity, it is recommended to promote self-complexity through exploratory behavior.