Mindfulness, Emotional Intelligence and Mental Toughness in Successful and Unsuccessful Karate Athletes in Iran Men’s Karate Super League

According to numerous studies in sport psychology, it is proved that optimal athletic performance relates to many psychological factors and behavioral characteristics influence on athletic development. This paper is aimed to compare mindfulness, emotional intelligence and mental toughness in successful and unsuccessful karate athletes in Iranian men’s karate super league. This research is a kind of casual-comparative research and the research population consists of Iranian men’s karate super league in Kumite section in 1394. Also, primary data is provided by the available method from 70 karate men, including two teams from high ranked and three teams in lower ranked position. Then, using information from competitions and results for each athlete, the optimal performance of karate men is calculated and two successful and unsuccessful groups are determined (each group includes 30 athletes). The research material in this work includes the demographic questionnaire, the sport mindfulness scale, the Self-Report EI Test and the mental toughness quesioneri_48. After normalization of data using the K-S and Shapiro-Wilk tests, an independent T test results show that the emotional intelligence and mental toughness between successful and unsuccessful athletes were significant difference. However, there was no significant difference between mindfulness. Finally, the results indicate that the psychological characteristics have an effect on the success and the performance of the two different groups which are in the highest ranked of Asia and world karate.