Kvinnliga elithandbollsspelares upplevelse av socialt stöd i den dubbla karriären

Sammanfattning: The aim of this study is to describe the experience of social support among female elite athletes who combine handball with higher education, with the underlying purpose to describe these persons’ experience of the functions of the support. These functions are materialistic, informative and emotional. There are ten women in the ages 22 to 24 (M=23.1, S=0,83) participating in the study. The study uses a semi-structured interview, based on two articles that studied social support (Knight et al., 2018; Schaefer et al., 1981). The result was sorted in three categories: emotional support, materialistic support and informative support. The result showed that women experienced emotional support, especially affinity, in the dual career (DC). Materialistic support was experienced in terms of support thru adjustment from coach and university. However, materialistic support was also identified lacking. Lastly, informative support, in shape of information and guidance in dual career, was experienced missing.