Cohesion and leadership in individual sports: a social network analysis of participation in recreational running groups

Sixty percent of recreational runners in the United States use running groups to participate in the sport. Within these groups, cohesion, or the process of working together to achieve goals and objectives, can develop. The purpose of this study was to investigate the levels of cohesion occurring among recreational runners using running groups to train for a running event. This study used social network analysis to assess task cohesion (achieving collective goals) and social cohesion (developing relationships among group members) in two running groups. The groups exhibited cohesion; task cohesion exceeded social cohesion. Informal leaders emerged alongside formal leaders in both groups. Running group organizers can use these findings to increase task cohesion and shared leadership in their groups. The results add to the few studies examining cohesion in individual sports and extend the application of social network analysis in sport research.