The government should improve psychological counseling for athletes by amending the National Sports Act (國民體育法), former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmaker Apollo Chen (陳學聖) said.
The lack of a certification system for sports psychiatrists could harm Taiwan’s professional athletes, said Chen, who is convener of the education, literature and sports division at the KMT-affiliated National Policy Foundation.
More than 30 percent of international Olympians were anxious about their physical and psychological conditions when the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted their training schedules, Chen said, citing an International Olympic Committee survey of 4,000 athletes from 135 countries in May 2020.
The nation’s certification system for sports counseling has since 2008 been administered by the non-governmental Society for Sports and Exercise Psychology of Taiwan, he said.
Taiwan does not have sports counseling regulations, but the Psychologists Act (心理師法) bars professionals in the field from calling themselves sports counselors, he said.
The sports and exercise psychology society has a four-tier qualification system for sports counselors, he said.
Only first and second-tier counselors can consult athletes on Taiwan’s national teams, but the society’s training program has only awarded fourth-tier rankings to 57 professionals and third-tier rankings to three counselors, he said.
The national teams are virtually unsupported, Chen added.
The government should bolster sports counseling services on all levels, from high schools to Olympic teams, he said.
The National Sports Act should be amended to define sports counseling as a profession and enable the creation of a regulatory body, he said.
An amendment should enable the Sports Administration to select an expert body to certify sports-focused psychiatrists, Chen said.
Taiwan’s Liu Ming-i, right, who also goes by the name Ray Liu, poses with a Chinese Taipei flag after winning the gold medal in the men’s physique 170cm competition at the International Fitness and Bodybuilding Federation Asian Championship in Ajman, United Arab Emirates, yesterday.
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