Data base.xlsx

The athlete’s perception of internal and external information seems to be crucial for the prevention of sports injuries and the self-regulation of healthy states. The goal of this cross-sectional study was to explore the relationship of athlete’s psychosomatic intelligence with injuries, mind-body practices, and organic dysfunctions in general. 217 young soccer players responded to a Psychosomatic Competence questionnaire assessing six dimensions: stress experience and stress regulation (SER), body-related health literacy (BHL), body-related cognitive congruence (BCC), mentalization (M), interoceptive awareness (IA) and general self-regulation (GSR). Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis analyses were performed to detect potential differences of the items of these dimensions with four factors: i) previous serious injuries, ii) current injuries, iii) mind-body practices, and iv) frequency of organic dysfunctions. The main findings point to positive relations between a) previous and current injuries with IA, b) current injuries with M, and c) mind-body practices with SER, BHL, BCC and M. In contrast, negative relations were found between organic dysfunctions with SER and BHL. Thus, organic dysfunctions seemed to be related to a lack of health self-regulation; and previous and current injuries seemed to increase interoceptive awareness. Furthermore, mind-body practices were positively related to self-regulation competencies and improved the detection and communication of health-related symptoms.