chapter 2 Flashcards
(22 cards)
Psychological Skills Training (PST)
Allows athletes to enhance their cognitive skills in sport.
Enables athlete to stay motivated, concentrate, avoid choking and build confidence.
- Education phase - Importance of PST is explained to athlete
- Acquisition phase - Athlete tries different psychological strategies through practice sessions tailored to an individual’s needs.
- Practice phase - Learning tasks are repeated until automatic through simulation (must be specific), where they’re integrated into performance. Use of a logbook/ training diary to monitor progress.
Motivation
is the direction + intensity of a person’s effort.
- Athletes must train hard to elicit chronic adaptations to perform at their best.
- This needs frequent training that requires high motivation levels.
Motivation
types:
Intrinsic- Athlete is motivated by internal factors such as the satisfaction of performing well.
Extrinsic- Athlete is motivated by external factors such as prize money, medals and awards.
To increase motivation, a coach may provide:
- Positive reinforcement - Encourage desirable behaviours by saying “good job”
- Negative reinforcement - Punish undesirable behaviours through the completion of push ups.
- Goal setting - Allow for 40-50% increased performance output through greater motivation to train and direction/focus.
o Because there is an end goal/ target providing reason for training, as well as smaller achievable goals.
MOTIOVATION
SMARTER Goals
- Specific (Outline actions)
- Measurable (metric for success, previous standards)
- Agreed (coach and athlete)
- Realistic (can be achieved)
- Time phased (specific date for completion)
- Exciting (challenging, motivating)
- Recorded (written down)
MOTIOVATION
Outcome goals
- End result of activity.
- Not great motivators as they’re influenced by factors outside of the athletes’ control
(such as other competitors). - Should reflect true desires of athlete.
- E.g. I want to win my race.
MOTIOVATION
Performance goals
- Individual actions
- Effective as athlete has direct control over these, reducing anxiety.
- E.g. I want to get a personal best or I want to shoot with 60% accuracy.
MOTIOVATION
Process goals
- Actions required to perform well, tactics.
- E.g. Running a specific team play, pacing yourself well during the race.
- Effective as they build focus and concentration and ensure the athlete is not obsessing over the final result.
AROUSAL
- Arousal is the level of readiness/energy experienced before and during performance.
- An optimal level of arousal exists where an athlete is ready to perform but does not succumb to excess anxiety or performance inhibition from excessive or under
arousal. - Arousal is influenced by confidence, type of competition and experience.
AROUSAL
The Inverted U Theory
- States that there is an optimal level of arousal for performance and if arousal is too high or low performance will be negatively affected.
- Lower arousal is required for more complex/introverted tasks requiring cognition. On the graph, the curve shifts to the left as lower arousal is needed for optimal
performance. - Higher arousal is needed for more simple, mastered tasks. On the graph, the curve shifts to the right as higher arousal is needed for optimal performance.
AROUSAL
- lack of arousal
- too much arousal
LACK OF AROUSAL:
- Poor performance
- Lack of motivation and energy
- Lack of effort/concentration, won’t focus on relevant cues
- Slow reaction time and slow decision making
TOO MUCH AROUSAL:
- Poor performance
- Anxiety / tension / uncoordinated / jerky movements
- Too focused on outcome, won’t focus on relevant cues
- Poor decision making
AROUSAL
STRATEGIES:
- Promoting arousal
Visualisation/mental imagery - Athlete pictures themselves performing a particular skill
successfully without moving. This is done to energise athlete or rehearse skill and enhance
neural pathways.
Positive self-talk - Athlete can say to themselves “I will get this in”.
Warm up - Increases HR and alertness.
Elevated breathing rate - Activates central nervous system, increasing awareness.
Upbeat music may help provide motivation and energy.
AROUSAL
STRATEGIES:
- Reducing arousal
Visualisation/mental imagery - Athlete pictures themselves performing a particular skill
successfully without moving. They may visualise calm images to reduce arousal and regain
focus.
Controlled breathing - Relaxation and focus.
Progressive muscle relaxation - Tensing and relaxing muscle groups from head to toe for 4-8
seconds + slow breathing to relax individual.
Stress inoculation training - Athlete placed in stressful situation and learns to become less anxious and deal with the situation better.
Slow, calm music to relax the athlete.
CONFIDENCE
Belief that oneself will be successful is vital to performance.
Self-efficacy - The belief that one can perform successfully in a sporting scenario.
CONFIDENCE
- lacking confidence
- Negative thoughts
- Lack of effort
- Focus on others
- Performance anxiety, stress
- Over arousal
CONFIDENCE
- over confidence
- Blasé/calm
- Arrogant
- Don’t push oneself
- Low arousal
- Bored
- Lack focus and attention
CONFIDENCE
Improve confidence
Positive self-talk, mental imagery, adequate sleep, resilience.
CONCENTRATION
Focus on relevant environmental cues, maintaining focus over time and awareness of
situation.
- A cue is a piece of information in the environment.
- A relevant cue is one that is significant for the performance of the skill. E.g. a ball.
- An irrelevant cue is not significant to the performance and may serve as a distraction
from the goal of the performance. E.g. Crowd noise.
Concentration drops when an athlete is distracted by future oriented thinking (what ifs) because athlete stops focusing on relevant environmental cues and instead attends to
irrelevant cues.
CONCENTRATION
Types of Focus:
Internal (self) vs External (other people and objects)
Narrow (one thing) vs Broad (many things)
- Broad + internal = Individual’s general thoughts/feelings. Analysing and planning.
- Broad + external = Focus on the external environment and opponent’s action.
- Narrow + internal = Focus on next movement, mental rehearsal.
- Narrow + external = Focus on one thing, like the ball.
CONCENTRATION
Choking
When under pressure, an athlete’s performance decreases because they become distracted when focussing on uncontrollable external factors or irrelevant cues or become overly critical of themselves.
- This can cause increased stiffness and loss of coordination.
SIMULATION
- A suitable method to enhance concentration as athlete learns to not focus on irrelevant cues.
- Making training environment as similar to competition environment as possible.
- Helps the brain to cope with competition environment.
SLEEP
- The amount and quality of sleep affects sporting performance
A lack of sleep can lead to:
* Impeded brain functions à poor decision making and focus.
* Slower reaction time and decreased accuracy.
* Tiredness and stress.
* Increased risk of injury.
* Decreased glycogen stores.
* Slower recovery due to inhibition of human growth hormone.
