To assess the level of mental toughness and to compare the factors of mental toughness among the athletes of different sports like, water polo, swimming and diving. Methodology: For the purpose of the study 33 swimmers (both and male and female), 31 water polo players (male) and 22 divers (both male and female) from All India Inter-University held at Amritsar, Punjab, 2013 were selected. The age of the athletes were ranging from 17 to 25 year of age. For the assessment of the data on mental toughness of the selected athletes the questionnaire “Mental Toughness Questionnaire” developed by Dr. Alan Goldberg was used to assess the mental toughness level of the athletes. Descriptive statistics was used to find out the mental toughness level of the selected athletes and to examine the significance differences among the athletes of different sports on mental toughness One Way ANOVA was used and the hypothesis was tested at .05 levels of significance. Results: The mean and standard deviation of the factors of mental toughness for shooters and archers are Rebound Ability (4.52 ± .85), (3.88 ± .93) and (3.77 ± 1.45), Handle Pressure (4.65 ± 1.05), (4.18 ± 1.24) and (4.45 ± .80), Concentration Ability (4.13 ± 1.06), (3.91 ± 1.23) and (4.77 ± .61), Level of Confidence (4.13 ± 1.45), (4.45 ± 1.12) and (4.45 ± 1.53) Motivation (4.32 ± .94), (4.12 ± 1.17) and (4.27 ± 1.32) and Total Mental Toughness Scores (21.74 ± 3.32), (20.55 ± 3.82) and (21.73 ± 3.63) respectively. To compare the mental toughness of the selected sports athletes, the one way analysis of variance was applied. The ANOVA result shows that the p-value of the factors of the sports motivation of the selected athletes is less than 0.05 and hence the F - value is significant at 5 % level. In order to determine which groups differs significantly, the post hoc mean comparison was obtained by applying LSD Test. The Post hoc Comparison of Means results shows that there exists a significant difference in the different factors in between Water Polo and Swimming (p = .018), Water Polo and Diving (p = .014) on Rebound Ability and Water Polo and Diving (p = .029), Swimming and Diving (p = .003) on Concentration Ability as their obtained p–values were less than 0.05 (p ˂ .05). This implies that in spite of similarities in nature of events there exist differences, or there are special requirements for participation in these sports. The existence of similarities in between these groups is prevalent in Swimming and Diving (p = .717) on Rebound Ability, Water Polo and Swimming (p = .088), Water Polo and Diving (p = .525) and Swimming and Diving (p = .358) on Handle Pressure, Water Polo and Swimming (p = .401) on Concentration Ability, Water Polo and Swimming (p = .341), Water Polo and Diving (p = .392) and Swimming and Diving (p = 1.00) on Level of Confidence, Water Polo and Swimming (p = .480), Water Polo and Diving (p = .875) and Swimming and Diving (p = .629) on Motivation, and Water Polo and Swimming (p = .187), Water Polo and Diving (p = .988) and Swimming and Diving (p = .236) on Total Mental Toughness Scores as their obtained p-values were greater than .05 (p ˃ .05). Conclusion: The present study shows that the significant differences in between athletes of Water Polo and Swimming, Water Polo and Diving. The Additional research is needed to find out the real reason of similarities and difference exists in the present study. The efficacy of proposed methods of enhancing mental toughness such as environmental manipulations, and mental skills training approaches need to be evaluated if the gap between theoretical research and practice is to be bridged.
