Trinity University

Susie P. Gonzalez
susie.gonzalez@trinity.edu
210-999-8445
Apr. 23, 2012

The Well-Being of Female Collegiate Athletes

Trinity University psychology professor is Co-PI on $2.3 million research grant

SAN ANTONIO - Carolyn Black Becker, a psychology professor at Trinity University, has been named one of two researchers who will head a five-year, $2.3 million study to improve the health and well-being of female collegiate athletes.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is funding for the project, which will be housed at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center, a campus of the Louisiana State University System in Baton Rouge, La. The research partnership includes Trinity University, Louisiana State University (LSU) Athletics, and American University in Washington, D.C.  

Becker, currently a residential fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University, will join Pennington Biomedical's Tiffany Stewart, assistant professor and director of the Behavior Technology Laboratory, as co-principal investigators (PI) of the study.

Titled the "Female Athlete Body Project: A Randomized Controlled Trial," the study will include 500 female athletes recruited among the sites' sports teams including basketball, cross country, track and field, volleyball, soccer, swimming, diving, tennis, golf, softball, gymnastics, and cheerleading.

"A critical component of this study is that it is a cooperative effort that includes athletic programs across the full range of NCAA divisions and has been designed in partnership with the collaborating athletic departments," Becker said.

Long interested in promoting a healthy body image for collegiate women, Becker developed the award-winning Reflections: Body Image Program in partnership with the Delta Delta Delta national sorority as well as local sororities at Trinity. One aspect of the Reflections program encourages women to stop references to "fat talk" when discussing their body shapes. Becker subsequently took a new direction in her research and partnered with Trinity's department of athletics in designing wellness programming for female athletes and in conducting pilot testing with support of a smaller grant from NIH.

Marc Powell, head athletic trainer at Trinity University, expressed enthusiasm for the new study. "After having seen the impact on our female student athletes during the pilot study we are excited about the opportunity to continue shining light on an important topic in women's athletics.  This grant will allow us to impact the well-being of our female student athletes not only while they are at Trinity but potentially for the rest of their lives," he said.

"This study will provide key information on the efficacy, acceptability, and feasibility of health promotion programming in female athletes." Stewart said.

NIH recognizes the importance of this work by giving the researchers the opportunity to collaborate on health and well-being promotion in female collegiate athletes. Pennington Biomedical conducts basic, clinical, and population research as it relates to understanding the causes of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and dementia.