High e-Performance: esports players’ coping skills and strategies

Aims: This paper investigates esports players’ coping skills and strategies to enhance their physical and mental health during their esports career.

Methods and Results: A total of 33 esports players – professional (n=21), semi-professional (n=6), amateur (n=4), and retired players (n=2) – participated in this study. Semi-structured interviews were carried out to identify participants coping skills and strategies. Thematic analysis was applied to analyse the data where three main themes were identified: life balance, social support, and sleep management. Life balance, through taking a break and participating in other activities, was named as a coping strategy to enhance their health and wellbeing. Social support was integral in creating coping strategies for esports players to ensure positive wellbeing, not only during their career but also after. Lastly, sleep management was recognized as a key coping skill to manage both training loads and competition pressure.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that the identified coping skills and strategies could be applied within bigger esports communities due to the range of participants included. Those coping skills/ strategies should be also considered when professional teams develop support initiatives to ensure players’ wellbeing and welfare.