Mental Toughness: Measurement and its Impact on Performance
Submitting Institution
Leeds Trinity UniversityUnit of Assessment
Sport and Exercise Sciences, Leisure and TourismSummary Impact Type
SocietalResearch Subject Area(s)
Medical and Health Sciences: Public Health and Health Services
Summary of the impact
The impact of International Centre for Mental Toughness Development
(ICMTD) research has primarily been on increasing the mental toughness of
young people and improving their attitudes to learning. This has been
achieved through Perry's involvement in numerous educational projects
working with vulnerable young people at risk of becoming NEET (Not in
Education, Employment or Training). Specifically, mental toughness has
been found to improve the performance, behaviour, and wellbeing of
individuals. His research has been spread among several countries,
ensuring a global impact and significant reach.
Underpinning research
The research is a progression of collaborative work conducted with the
University of Hull (Dr Peter Clough, Dr Keith Earle and Dr Adam Nicholls)
and University of Lincoln (Dr Lee Crust). Of late, key developments in
research involving John Perry (Senior Lecturer, Leeds Trinity University,
2010 - present), have (a) established the validity of the MTQ48 model and
the questionnaire, (b) established the relationships between mental
toughness and performance and (c) established the relationships between
mental toughness and psychological health and wellbeing.
Clough, Earle and Sewell (2002) conceptualised mental toughness as the
quality that determines how people effectively deal with challenge,
stressors and pressure, irrespective of prevailing circumstances. In doing
so, they presented the 4Cs model; challenge, commitment, control, and
confidence, which was measurable through a questionnaire, the Mental
Toughness Questionnaire- 48 (MTQ48). This questionnaire is the most
widely-used assessment of mental toughness globally and in 2013, it is
expected to be used by 2,700 test centres in business, health, sport, and
education, across 86 countries. Despite its widespread use, the factorial
validity had not been rigorously examined. After questions were raised in
published literature, Clough, Earle, Perry and Crust (2012) defended the
validity of the MTQ48, citing support for its criterion validity, before
Perry, Clough, Crust, Earle and Nicholls (2012) presented robust support
for the factorial validity of the measure using a sample of 8207 and a
series of confirmatory factor analyses and exploratory structural equation
models. This large, heterogeneous sample was collected from subsamples in
senior management, lower and middle management, clerical/administrative
staff, athletes, and students. Examining single-factor, four-factor, and
six-factor models, Perry et al. reported satisfactory model fit in all
samples. Further, with the exception of control of emotion, all subscales
yielded good reliability.
Working with collaborators at the University of Basel (Gerber et al,
2012) Perry has shown that mental toughness is linked to mental health.
The results showed that mental toughness mitigated against the
relationship between high stress and depression in adolescents. It is
argued that improving mental toughness may be an effective way of
enhancing mental health in groupings that are difficult to reach by more
typical health interventions.
Perry's role in this recent research has been primarily as a
psychometrics expert. In the response paper (Clough et al., 2012), Perry
wrote a significant section on the statistical assessment of measurement
scales. This was one of three major points made in the paper. The paper on
the factorial validity was led by Perry, as the main work on the paper
required complex data analyses. In the Gerber et al. paper, Perry again
offered his statistical input.
References to the research
• Clough, P. J., Earle, K., Perry, J. L., & Crust, L. (2012).
Comment on "Progressing measurement in mental toughness: A case example of
the Mental Toughness Questionnaire 48" by Gucciardi, Hanton, and Mallett
(2012). Sport, Exercise, and Performance Psychology, 1, 283-287.
doi:10.1037/a0029771 [Impact Factor = N/A, APA journal only one year old]
• Gerber, M., Kalak, N., Lemola, K., Clough, P.
J., Perry, J. L., Pühse, U., Holsboer- Trachsler E.,
& Brand, S. (2012). Are adolescents with high mental toughness levels
more resilient against stress? Stress Health. doi:10.1002/smi.2447
[Impact Factor = 1.229]
• Perry, J. L., Clough, P.J., Crust, L., Earle, K., &
Nicholls, A. (2013). Factorial validity of the mental toughness
questionnaire-48. Personality and Individual Differences, 54,
587-592. doi:10.1016/paid.2012.11.020 [Impact Factor = 1.877]
These papers are all in peer-review journals. The `Factorial validity of
the mental toughness questionnaire-48' paper was also presented at the
British Psychological Society (BPS) Northeast and Northwest Annual
Conference in Manchester in November 2012. For this, Perry won an Early
Career Researcher award and wrote an article for the Northeast BPS
Newsletter. Perry also supplied a shortened version of the mental
toughness questionnaire and an article on it to the Dutch version of
popular magazine, Psychology Today, after being contacted by the
editor. Most recently, Perry was invited to speak at the International
Psychology Conference, Dubai, on mental toughness. This was the first
internal psychology conference held in the Gulf, where the model of mental
toughness presented by Clough, Perry and others is widely used.
Details of the impact
Perry is a founding member of the International Centre for Mental
Toughness Development, which is run by AQR Ltd, an international test
publisher and business consultancy. As a group, there are currently
several key current projects demonstrating an educational impact.
The validation of the MTQ48 has proved important for a number of
educational bodies who use it as routine. For example the Institute of
Leadership & Management (ILM) is the UK's largest management body,
combining industry-leading qualifications and specialist member services.
In 2011, 90,000 people gained an ILM qualification. The MTQ48 is available
free of charge to its members and is incorporated into a number of their
courses. Also, in 2011, Dubai Women's College established the Middle
East's first mental toughness centre for education. This will act as a hub
for the International Centre for Mental Toughness Development in the
U.A.E.
There are presently several ongoing funded projects to demonstrate the
educational impact. These include:
Right Track Project- Department for Education funding was awarded
to `Reach for the Right Track' project (http://www.reachfor.org.uk/right-track-project)
to address the Improving Outcomes Theme 6 priority: Early intervention to
increase participation by, and improve the achievements of, disadvantaged
young people. Right Track is an initiative delivering bespoke packages of
support to 4,500 young people (school years 6, 9, 10 and 11) from across
the United Kingdom, including Mental Toughness assessments (validated by
Perry) and a ten-week coaching programme (developed by Dr. Clough at
University of Hull) in order to improve attainment, attendance, behaviour
and ultimately progression of the target cohort. Initial evaluation has
shown that 49% of the sample increased their mental toughness over this
time period. Of this group, the average increase in mental toughness was
19%. The impact of this was that those indicating a desire to study
full-time after year 11 rose from 17% to 28%, pupils indicating that they
liked being at school rise from 53% to 60%, and pupils believing that
"teachers are always getting at me" dropped from 40% to 29%. Teacher
feedback was similarly positive, suggesting that 45% of pupils improved
their behaviour, 33% improved their attendance, and 46% improved their
work in class. Indeed, attendance data highlights that of those pupils
with attendance below 85% at the beginning of the project, 73% improved
their attendance (on average, by 6.2%).
The main input from Perry in this project is two-fold. Firstly, he
conducted the statistical analysis from the first phase of the project.
Secondly, he has been central to the development and validation of a
career management tool, "Carrus", which assesses ability and
behaviour-based personality traits, creating reports to help career
management for young people, which is to be provided alongside the MTQ48.
Greater Merseyside Connexions (GMC) have started a 3-year project working
with 3,900 vulnerable young people mostly aged 14-16. The purpose is to
identify ways of preventing these becoming labelled as NEETs (Not in
Education, Employment or Training). It includes people in public care,
people with a learning difficulty and young offenders. GMC are keen to
work with Leeds Trinity to improve the behaviour and attendance of the
young people, and to help them acquire qualifications and employment, by
testing and improving mental toughness.
HULT International Business School run the biggest international MBA
programme in the world across 6 campuses; London, Boston, San Francisco,
Shanghai, Dubai and Sao Paulo. They are about to open a seventh in New
York. For the last year they have been using the MTQ48 on all students at
the beginning and end of their MBA and are then tracking their employment
post- graduation.
Mental toughness is not just beneficial to students, but to teachers
also. Teaching Leaders (TL) is an organisation aiming to develop what they
refer to as "middle leaders" to enable them to take up more senior
positions in education. There are currently around 200 middle leaders on
the TL Fellows programme. They are regularly assessed by themselves and
peers against a competency framework to track their development. They are
also participating in a project with Perry and Clough to assess their
mental toughness throughout the period and they have received training to
enhance this mindset. Halfway through the project, one year in,
performance against the competencies has significantly improved in all
areas. Analysis conducted and presented by Perry show that this is
partially attributable to mental toughness.
From his work on mental toughness and the impact on education, Perry was
invited to give a day's training to the Oman Ministry of Higher Education
at London South Bank University in November 2013. Further, he has been
asked to conduct additional research regarding higher education in
partnership with City and Guilds in 2014 across several nations in the
middle east.
Sources to corroborate the impact
(1) Interim formal evaluation of Right Track project available on
request. Once the evaluation is complete it will be publicly available at:
http://www.reachfor.org.uk/right-track-project.
(2) Kieran Gordon, Chief Executive, Greater Merseyside Connexions:
corroborating lower levels of stress and better performance of managers.
(3) Centre for Mental Toughness in Education in Dubai:
http://news.hct.ac.ae/2011/10/dwc-launches-the-middle-easts-first-mental-toughness-center-for-education/
(4) Teaching Leaders fellow programme curriculum: http://www.teachingleaders.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Curriculum.pdf