Identifying the Benefits of Phygital Development in Sports Science Education

The purpose of study was to identify the benefits of phygital environment in sports science education. This research was a qualitative exploratory study that has been done using a thematic analysis. The research population consisted of expert faculty members with educational, research, and executive experience in the field of education and emerging technologies in sport and according to the nature of the research, 12 experts were interviewed through purposive sampling until reaching the theoretical saturation. The tool used in research was a semi-structured interview. The intra-subject agreement method was used to ensure the reliability of findings. The criterion of reliability or trustworthiness, which includes four related criteria including credibility, reliability, transferability and confirmability, was used to refer to evaluation of result quality. The thematic analysis by Braun and Clarke’s (2006) method led to the extraction of 70 codes, 10 sub-themes and four main themes. The findings revealed that the benefits of phygital environment in sports science education included "Performance improvement", "Training improvement", "Service quality", and "Diversity and creativity". Considering the nature of the field of sports science and the combination of theoretical courses with practical courses, pursuing education in a purely virtual environment cannot meet the educational needs of students. Therefore, using a digital environment can largely address the concerns of sports science instructors regarding strengthening students' skills, providing desirable services, and creating creativity in the virtual education process, and help cover some of the weaknesses of purely virtual education in teaching practical courses.