Despite evidence for the benefits of debriefing and reflecting on decisions, and the existence of best practice guidance, no study to date has aimed to investigate and develop decision-making debriefing in sport to improve athlete’s decision-making. To address these gaps, the thesis uses semi-structured and stimulated recall interviews to investigate decision-making debriefing processes from multiple perspectives in one elite sailing team. This provided greater understanding of the benefits of reflecting on decisions (i.e., speeding up learning and psychological benefits), the process of decision-making debriefs (i.e., the when, what, how), and important factors to consider to ensure that decision-making debriefs are effective (i.e., the physical and emotional context, and the people involved). To provide a rich and accurate insight into decision-making debriefing practice, the thesis then used observational methods to compare actual practice to declared practice. Results showed that there were discrepancies between what participants said they did and what they actually did, highlighting that perceptions alone cannot be relied upon and objective feedback may be required to instigate accurate reflection and encourage change.
The thesis uses behaviour change theory and applies a naturalistic, individualised, longitudinal action research intervention to develop decision-making debriefing practice in the elite sailing team. By successfully targeting identified barriers to behaviour change, coach’s and sailor’s awareness and reflection of their decision-making practice increased, they progressed in their ability to debrief decision-making effectively, and the changes made were perceived to have a positive impact on learning better from decisions and consequent performance. More specifically, the potential importance of targeting a combination of three elements to optimise decision-making debriefing practice was highlighted; deep analysis of decisions through appropriate reflection and questioning, theoretical knowledge of how decisions are made; and the broader debriefing process. The implications of these findings for both theory and practice are discussed.