Author(s): MONTENEGRO, S., PRESTANTI, I., SERAFINI, S., FUSCO, A., IZZICUPO, P., SARTOR, F., Institution: UNIVERSITY OF VERONA, Country: ITALY, Abstract-ID: 956

INTRODUCTION
University students who are simultaneously engaged in elite sports programs are identified as dual career (DC) students (1). DC entails complex resource management as peak athletic career often coincides with the most intense period of the academic years, generating a higher systemic load (i.e., sum of hours spent studying and training). Despite the "zero-sum game" theory (2), which suggests that athletic commitments hinder academic potential, academic proficiency of DC athletes may match or even outperform their non-athlete peers. This study aimed to investigate whether the efficiency paradox occurred in DC students. We hypothesized that DC students would have an equal or even higher Academic Return On Investment (ROI) for a given perception of cognitive effort.
METHODS
Eleven Dual Career powerlifters (DC group) and nine sedentary students (C group) underwent a 10-week monitoring period covering the entire academic semester. Cognitive effort was assessed in both groups using the Paas Mental Effort Rating Scale (PMERS) (3), while Training Rating of Perceived Exertion (RPE) was monitored using the CR10 Borg scale (4). RPE was exclusively collected in the DC group. Academic ROI was computed as the number of exams passed per 100 h of study, academic efficiency was calculated as ROI/(study duration x PMERS).

RESULTS
In the DC group a repeated measure positive correlation between weekly PMERS and weekly Training RPE was found (r = 0.29, 95% CI [0.063, 0.48], p = 0.013,). Academic efficiency was numerically higher in the DC group (DC:0.49 ± 0.61vs C:0.14 ± 0.25), but it did not reach statistical significance (p=0.06, Cliff’s δ = 0.52). Consistently, academic ROI was numerically higher in the DC group (DC: 5.4 ± 3.9 vs C: 2.3 ± 2.8) but not significant (p=0.12, Cliff’s δ = 0.41). Large effect sizes suggest that such study should be replicated with a larger sample.

CONCLUSION
This preliminary evaluation showed that cognitive and training perceptions of effort may be related, and that the efficiency paradox in DC students is likely to occur as the DC group had a trend towards a higher academic efficiency than the C group. Yet results were not significant, most likely because of an insufficient sample size. A larger study accounting for an appropriate statistical power analysis is required to conclusively accept or reject the efficiency paradox hypothesis.

REFERENCES
1 Stambulova N, et al. Psychol Sport Exerc. 2024;71:102572.
2 Maloney MT, McCormick RE. J Hum Resour. 1993;28(3):555.
3 Paas FGWC. J Educ Psychol. 1992;84(4):429–34.
4 Foster C, et al. J Strength Cond Res. 2001;15(1):109–15.