Joint Analysis of First and Third Persons Data. Genesis of an Original Methodology in Sport Sciences

Classically studied from methodologies and partitioned research programs operating independently, first person data (documenting actor’s experience from his own point of view) and third person data (documenting external and public dimensions of behaviors) are, for a decade, articulated in order to access to a more complex, global and unitary view of acts. How did the Sport Science field contribute to the spread of this original methodology consisting in the confrontation of heterogeneous materials? This epistemological paper studies socials and epistemic requirements from its genesis (progressive conquest of diversified objects, reference to exemplars works, strewing of surveys from a hard core of authors…) to the establishment of a new normal science activity. It also formalizes the diversity of joints between all data (correlations, discrepancies...), before appraising the specifically generated knowledge effects (robustness strengthening by triangulation, discovery of new patterns, processing of intervention practices...). Ultimately, articulation between first and third persons data is an example of genuinely interdisciplinary practice.