Athlete Development & Transitions
How athletes move through junior pathways, selection systems and the transition to senior international participation.
RESEARCH IN CONTEXT
Research and
Publications.
Questions grounded in the development, learning and performance realities of athletes and students in Trinidad and Tobago.
RESEARCH POSITION
Local questions.
Defensible methods.
Useful evidence.
Research should be theoretically informed, methodologically transparent and relevant to the settings in which decisions are made. Caribbean sport provides important questions that cannot always be answered by simply importing assumptions from other systems.
RESEARCH THEMES
Four connected
areas of inquiry.
The portfolio links athlete pathways, psychological performance, responsible practice and the education of future professionals.
Performance Psychology
Psychological skills, confidence, anxiety, self-efficacy and the realities of preparing for performance.
Applied Practice
Needs assessment, intervention planning, professional boundaries and reflective evidence-based practice.
Research & Kinesiology Education
How students and practitioners understand, design and use research to improve decisions.
SELECTED WORK
Research in
development.
Current and recent projects combine athlete-level data, programme evaluation and educational research.
Junior-to-Senior Transition in Trinidad and Tobago Athletics
A longitudinal athlete-pathway dataset examining junior exposure, CARIFTA participation and progression to senior representation.
Elite Champion Mindset in Digital Sports Media
A reflexive thematic analysis examining how elite champions describe greatness, preparation, adversity and sustained achievement in digital sport discourse.
Pre-Performance Routines in Caribbean and SIDS Sport
Work distinguishing functional routines from ritualised behaviour and developing a low-resource delivery model for Caribbean sport settings.
Late Specialization and Talent Development
A context-sensitive review of late specialization, talent pathways and junior-to-senior transition in Trinidad and Tobago sport.
Physical Activity and Values-Based Education
Monitoring implementation and student outcomes within a national school-based physical activity pilot for primary-school students.
PUBLICATIONS & PRESENTATIONS
Selected scholarly
and professional outputs.
Verified outputs are arranged in reverse chronological order. Each record links to its ResearchGate page, DOI, institutional source or conference record where available.
RESEARCHGATE RESEARCH RECORDFollow current publications, preprints and presentations
VIEW PROFILE ↗PREPRINT↗PREPRINT↗PREPRINT↗PRESENTATION↗PREPRINT↗CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION↗JOURNAL ARTICLE↗ACADEMIC PRESENTATION↗RESEARCH OUTPUT↗POSITION STAND↗INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH↗
“Once You Get a Taste of Greatness, It's an Unquenchable Desire”: A Reflexive Thematic Analysis of Elite Champion Mindset in Digital Sports Media Discourse
Melville, M. Preprint, September 2026.
From CARIFTA to the Senior International Stage: Junior-Pathway Characteristics and Senior Transition among Trinidad and Tobago World U20 Athletes
Melville, M. Preprint, August 2026.
Ritual or Routine? A Functional Account of Pre-Performance Routines and a Model for Their Low-Resource Delivery in Caribbean and Small-Island Developing-State Sport
Melville, M. Preprint, August 2026.
Ritual or Routine? The Science Behind Pre-Performance Routines
Melville, M. Presentation, August 2026.
Late Specialization, Talent Development, and Junior-to-Senior Transition in Trinidad and Tobago Sport: A Narrative Review
Melville, M. Preprint, July 2026.
11th Caribbean Sport Science Conference
Member of the UTT CKPES delegation, Kingston, Jamaica.
The importance of physical education and sport in primary (Elementary) school
Dollaway, K. C., Hannays, K., Paul, J., & Melville, M. International Journal of Physical Education, Sports and Health, 11(3), 244–251.
The fundamentals of research
Science Exhibition Week Project inauguration, The University of Trinidad and Tobago.
The relationship between grit, intrinsic motivation and conscientiousness as predictors of academic achievement in undergraduate sports studies students
Melville, M., Dollaway, K. C., & Paul, J. M.
The Preparticipation Examination
Dollaway, K. C., Paul, J. M., & Melville, M.
Psychological well-being, fatigue and psychological distress among scholarship and non-scholarship students
Research involving UTT students in Physical Education and Sports Studies.
Further records are available through the UTT academic research profile ↗, Google Scholar ↗ and ResearchGate ↗.
COLLABORATION
Research that strengthens
Caribbean evidence.
Potential collaborations may involve athlete development, performance psychology, programme evaluation or research education.
Discuss collaboration ↗