Dr. Doug Gardner has worked as a mental performance coach over the past 23 years, has been a member of AASP since 1994 and a CMPC from 1998-2020. A pioneer in the field, Dr. Gardner has been a fierce advocate for youth sport participants and has dedicated his career to creating safe and healthy learning environments for individuals throughout the athletic lifespan, from children to professional athletes.
From his recent work in new ecosystem of professional esports, along with experiences working for the Boston Red Sox, the NFL Players Association and with competitive youth sport athletes seeking Olympic, collegiate and professional careers, Dr. Gardner is a leader in the development of large scale educational programming and curriculum across the athletic spectrum. Dr. Gardner has counseled thousands of individual athletes in navigating the challenges and obstacles they face as they pursue their athletic and academic dreams.
Dr. Gardner has been at the forefront of online sport and exercise psychology program and course development since 2008. Dr. Gardner has developed online master’s and doctoral programs and has served as a subject matter expert and core adjunct faculty member at National University and Argosy University. Dr. Gardner has published research and textbook chapters in the areas of leadership, coaching behaviors, team dynamics, moral behavior in both traditional and esports.
Based in California, Dr. Gardner continues to seek new and challenging performance ecosystems to work within and is a vocal leader advocating for the growing importance of performance psychology.
Areas of Expertise
Any and all individuals in high performing environments, from youth, collegiate, Olympic and professional sport to corporate leaders and individuals in other high performance environments, especially those in positions of leadership who are able to create healthy and productive working/learning environments.
Research Interests
- Leadership
- Coaching
- Team cohesion
- Team dynamics
- Structural sport psychology
- Psycho-social and cultural issues within sport
- Underserved populations
- Sport as an educational vehicle
- Athlete rights
