Keep the Gloves On: Personality, Skills, and Stories that Sustain Goalkeeping

Abstract

Soccer goalkeepers occupy a unique position that concentrates tactical, technical, and psychosocial demands within a highly evaluative role. While generic athlete development has been widely studied, goalkeeper-specific talent development remains underexamined, particularly with regard to the psychological ingredients that enable both progression and sustainable participation. This study examined how personality traits, trainable psychological characteristics, and lived narratives jointly shape goalkeepers’ trajectories from early engagement to late adolescence/early adulthood.

Forty-eight male goalkeepers (9–22 years) enrolled in elite training centers participated. A mixed-method, sequential design combined (a) standardized questionnaires indexing personality and psychological skills with (b) life-course interviews reconstructing typical sequences of experience along the pathway to elite performance. Instruments included the Description in Five Dimensions (D5D) for younger players, the Personality for Professionals Inventory (PfPI), the Inventory of Dysfunctional Tendencies (TD12), and the Psychological Characteristics of Developing Excellence-Short Version (PCDEQ-SV). Interviews were analyzed inductively to identify recurrent sequences and themes; quantitative data were described relative to age bands and interpreted against appropriate norms and cut-points.

Qualitative analysis yielded four typical sequences: (1) Safe Starts (under 9): playful, multi-sport engagement scaffolded by family and peers; (2) Surging Currents (9–14 years): rapid specialization and rising expectations amid ambivalent social support; (3) Shaky Grounds (15–16 years): instability marked by intensified competition, dual-career pressures, and injuries; and (4) Uncharted Fields (17+): diverging pathways toward elite pursuit or alternative projects (e.g., academics).

Questionnaires aligned with and refined these narratives. In Surging Currents, D5D profiles showed comparatively higher Conscientiousness and Emotional Stability, with Introversion elevated relative to athletic norms, and PCDEQ-SV indicated strong self-regulatory tendencies but weaker imagery skills. In Shaky Grounds, PfPI suggested developing yet fragile confidence and only moderate self-discipline/impulse control, coinciding with perceived support dips; TD12 signaled emerging meticulousness and self-centered/distant tendencies requiring monitoring. By Uncharted Fields, PfPI profiles displayed increases in Self-Discipline, Impulse Control, and Emotional Stability alongside slight declines in Agreeableness and sociability, an adaptive but potentially distancing orientation in high-pressure contexts. TD12 patterns indicated consolidation of vigilant and perfectionistic styles in a subset of athletes. Across ages, PCDEQ-SV trends suggested maturation of evaluative and organizational skills while imagery remained a trainable gap.

Together, findings portray goalkeeper development as a dynamic, multi-level process in which trait dispositions, trainable psychological skills, and personal narratives co-evolve with shifting social ecologies and performance demands. Practically, the results recommend (a) age-specific targets: introducing structured imagery and goal-setting in early specialization; scaffolding dual-career coping and social support at 15–16; and addressing perfectionism/vigilance and role clarity from 17+; (b) integrated monitoring combining PCDEQ-SV (skills), PfPI/D5D (traits), and TD12 (risk markers) with coach/parent feedback; and (c) narrative-informed coaching that acknowledges turning points and helps athletes author sustainable pathways.

This study advances a goalkeeper-specific, psychologically informed model of talent development and sustainability. By linking measurable profiles to lived sequences, it offers actionable levers for practitioners seeking to keep the gloves on (longer), while protecting well-being and performance potential.