On research into the relationship between personality traits and the sporting level of competitive, professional and elite athletes.

Data on the relationship between personality traits and athletes' level of sportsmanship are not sufficiently documented. Therefore, it is reasonable to look for differences in personality traits between athletes from different levels: amateur, competitive and professional, as these groups of athletes function differently on a daily basis. Therefore, the aim of this article was to gain knowledge about the relationship between personality traits and the sporting level of athletes. The experiment examined male and female athletes (N = 119) aged 19-34, including 100 Polish professional athletes: 30 basketball players, 40 football players, 30 kyokushin style karate competitors; and 19 professional athletes (among them were the elite: 3 Olympic medallists): 4-person Polish Biathlon Team, 7-person Polish Luge Team, 8-person Swiss Mountain Bike (MTB) Team. The NEO-FFI Personality Questionnaire was used. Analyses were performed with the IBM SPSS Statistics 29.0 package at a statistical significance of α = 0.05. Significant differences were found in comparisons between groups of athletes: football players and karate competitors (in severity of neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness), football players and basketball players (in severity of neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness), football players and lugers (in severity of agreeableness), football players and mountain bikers (in severity of neuroticism). One significant difference was noted in the comparisons between athletes from different levels: competitive athletes had higher neuroticism severity than elite athletes. A weak and negative correlation between neuroticism and sporting levels was verified. But no correlation was shown between personality traits and the likelihood of becoming a professional. It was concluded that the observed differences between the studied groups of athletes could be derived from the specifics of the different sports. The elite are characterised by a lower intensity of neuroticism in relation to the competitive athletes, which can be seen in the relationship: the lower the neuroticism, the higher the sporting level.

A thing about karate in physical culture.

This paper deals with karate activity in the areas of physical culture in the broad sense. It is a concise and clear approach to the topic, which aimed to conceptualise the inclusion of karate in areas of physical culture as a contemporarily attractive physical activity. Karate was described here as a combat sport, martial art, and self-defence system in the following areas of physical culture: physical education, physiotherapy, recreation, sports, and tourism. Reference here was made to physical activity focused on bunkai (circuit interpretation exercises), kata (circuit exercises), kihon (technical exercises), and kumite (combat exercises). It has been determined that practitioners' involvement in karate culture affects their level of sense of coherence. In addition, the conditioning for using karate in physical culture to the maintenance of health was mentioned. Here, reference was made to the perceptual perspective of the bodily and mental practice of karate for health. It has been established that this can be effective by adopting only the objectives of karate as martial art. Based on the above, it was concluded that practising karate is present in all areas of physical culture as combat sport, martial art, and self-defence system, but practising karate only as martial art provides opportunities for maintenance of health.

Perspective on solving the problem of declining interest in physical activity in Poland.

One of the leading areas of Polish research addressed in the physical culture sciences, is the declining interest in physical activity. The likely reason for this situation may be the inadequate communication of physical culture to today's generations: BB (baby boomers), X (great unknowns), Y (millennials), Z (snowflakes), Alpha (digital). Therefore, the aim of this article is to address the problem of declining interest in physical activity in Poland by identifying the appropriate approach of teachers, trainers and instructors to today's generations. The specifics of BB, X, Y, Z and Alpha generations are described and their expectations regarding physical activity are indicated. It was concluded that activating these social groups should be done by prompting topics that are important to them. Thus, BB value organizational stability, X need to see the purposefulness and attractiveness of the activities, Y equate physical activity with personal development, Z only take up useful forms of activities, and finally Alpha like smart technology-assisted activities.

The validity of utilizing karate in youth safety education.

This article aims to present a new argument on the validity of utilizing karate in youth safety education. First, the important role of safety education and the need to seek new means of influencing young people is presented and the significant role of sport in this area. The field of Far Eastern combat sports was underlined here as being particularly important because they contain internal codes of moral conduct. Therefore, the new argument is to take the perspective of karate as a combat sport, martial art, and self defence system in one. Karate as a combat sport refers to fighting skills in the following directions: traditional, sport and Olympic; and in the following systems: semi contact, knockdown, full contact, mix fighting. Karate as a martial art has a health-promoting character and emphasises the psycho-physical development of practitioners and the recognition of ethical codes. And karate as a self defence system is concerned with proficiency in out-of-sport confrontations, but also in risk assessment. Karate has been found to be an effective means in educating young people to safety, but in order for it to be effective, it needs to be adopted in its entirety. Because the combat sport perspective activates youth in physical culture, the martial art perspective educates according to norms and rules; and the self defence system perspective teaches how to act in difficult situations.