psychology skills 1

Question 1

what is psychology skill training?

Answer 1

• An approach to intervention in sport psychology
  ○ Part of the ‘doing’ of being an applied sport psych
  ○ Intervene and help people.
• The ultimate goal of PST is self-regulation
• Athletes effectively function on their own without needing constant direction from coach or psych
  ○ Help them self-regulate (nerves, anxiousness, confidence, skill execution, arousal etc.)

Question 2

what are the 3 myths of PST?

Answer 2

• PST is just for problem athletes
• PST is just a quick fix
• PST is just for elite athletes

Question 3

where has research for PST primarily come from?

Answer 3

• research on elite athletes
  § Olympic athletes- what sets them apart from everyone else.
• experiences from coaches and athletes

Question 4

what did Krane and Williams (2021) find about the characteristics of elite level performers?

Answer 4

• In American collegiate system.
• Higher confidence, self-regulation, concentration, positive thoughts, imagery, determination
• All things we can work on/ maintain using PST.

Question 5

what is the efficacy of PST according to Brown and Fletcher (2017)?

Answer 5

Reviewed PST literature: meta-analysis/ systematic review.
○ Psychological (PST) and psychosocial (group level) interventions improved performance
○ Performance effects lasted about a month
§ Have to keep doing it to be successful
○ Interventions are better when coaches deliver
§ Help coaches set goals throughout the season- athletes trust coach.
○ Somewhat greater effects for men vs. women
§ Male dominated environment within sport.

Question 6

what is anxiety?

Answer 6

• Anxiety/arousal impacts performance
  ○ For the better (if interpreted positively and ‘buffered by self- confidence’)- Hanton & Mallalieu (2014)
  ○ For the worse detrimental effect
  ^ Non-clinical/sub-clinical categories of anxiety.
• Feelings of anxiety during performance can be helped by sports psychologists but generalised anxiety cannot be helped with as there is a “blurred line”.

Question 7

what are the 3 categories of anxiety in athletes?

Answer 7

• Cognitive- head
  § Worry and negative thoughts
• Somatic- body
  § Nervousness and tension, increased perspiration, pounding heart
• Behavioural (less research)- response
  § Tense facial expressions
  § Changes in communication

Question 8

what is problem focused coping?

Answer 8

• Efforts to alter or manage the problem that’s causing the anxiety / stress
• Tackle the cause of the problem
  ○ Information gathering
  ○ Pre-comp / Competition plans
  ○ Goal setting
  ○ Self-Talk
  ○ Time management

Question 9

what is emotion focused coping?

Answer 9

• Regulate the emotional responses to the problem that causes the anxiety / stress
• Tackle the emotional response specifically.
  ○ Meditation
  ○ Relaxation
  ○ Wishful thinking
  ○ Reappraisal (negative to positive)
• Mental and behavioural withdrawal (withdraw from an emotion that is too difficult to cope with)

Question 10

what is the matching hypothesis?

Answer 10

• Match the intervention used with the type of anxiety experienced.
• Anxiety management technique should be matched with the anxiety problem
  ○ Cognitive anxiety = mental relaxation
  ○ Somatic anxiety = physical relaxation
• Crossover effects
  ○ Mental relaxation will help with somatic anxiety as well as cognitive anxiety
  ○ Physical relaxation will help with cognitive anxiety as well as somatic anxiety
• Maynard et al. (1995)

Question 11

what did Kudlackova et al (2013) find about muscle relaxation?

Answer 11

found professional athletes use more relaxation techniques than collegiate and recreational athletes
○ Look at what they do at the top and implement it lower down
Something about being in a relaxed state that helps elite level athlete.

Question 12

what did Jacobson (1938) find about progressive muscle relaxation?

Answer 12

Progressive muscle relaxation - not specific for sports psychology
○ Tensing specific muscle groups and relaxing them
Learning to feel tension and let it go - feel the tension and the relaxed state- relax more deeply.

Question 13

what is progressive muscle relaxation?

Answer 13

• Progressive- across different parts of the body
• Contrast between tension and relaxation
• Bringing awareness to the body to then relax it

Question 14

what did Öst (1988) develop for progressive muscular relaxation?

Answer 14

Developed an applied variant
○ Tense (5 sec), 50% release (5 sec), 100% release (10-15 sec)
○ Bring time down for relaxation- immediate
§ Where PMR was specifically applied to certain domains (including sport)
§ Need some level of arousal to perform will in sport
* Intervention- must be aware of individual’s context

Question 15

how does breathign change depending on anxiety?

Answer 15

• Breathing in and holding increases muscle tension
• Breathing out decreases muscle tension
• Therefore, learning to breathe in high-pressure situations is crucial

Question 16

what is Diaphragmatic breathing?

Answer 16

slowly inhale (5 secs), imagining that the lungs are divided into three levels:
1. fill the lower level of the lungs (push the diaphragm down and force the abdomen out)
2. fill the middle portion of the lungs by expanding the chest cavity and raising the rib cage
3. fill the upper lebel of the lungs by raising the chest and shoulders
* exhale slowly (5 secs) by pulling the abdomen in and lowering the shoulders and chest.
* notice the release of tension in your shoulders and abdomen.

Question 17

what is the importance of breahing in sport?

Answer 17

• Depends on the sport
• Break in play
  ○ Before serving in tennis
  ○ Before putting a golf ball
• To enhance skill execution
  ○ Belly breathing in Powerlifting/Olympic
  ○ Releasing the trigger/bow- breath out when throwing

Question 18

according to Stoker et al (2016) what are the 4 key stages of pressure training?

Answer 18

1. demands of training
2. consequences of training
3. eductaion
4. stress inoculation training (SIT)

Question 19

what are demands of training (pressure training)?

Answer 19

recreate environment in training when stakes aren’t as high.
○ Task stressor:
§ time, reduced warm up, score.
○ Performer stressor:
§ preparation constraints, tactics (how much is given).
○ Environment stressor:
§ noise, whether they see course before hand.

Question 20

what are consequences of training (pressure training)?

Answer 20

○ Positive or negative based on performance:
§ may lose sponsorship, not get picked for a team, may lose out on major competitions.

Question 21

what is education (pressure training)?

Answer 21

○ Teach athletes how to cope, build awareness, and tell them why you’re doing pressure training:
§ don’t tell them doing the training before hand, go through period of reflection afterwards.
* Most important bit.

Question 22

what is self-talk?

Answer 22

way we talk to ourselves, or our inner minds/monologues
* Can be a positive psychological skill to enhance concentration and increase self- confidence
○ Enhance performance and well-being
* Can also act as a negative internal distractor to our attention and concentration
○ Detrimental to concentration.

Question 23

what is REBT?

Answer 23

• ellis- 1957
• rational emotional behaviour therapy
• self-talk in sport draws on the early ideas of cognitive therapy

Question 24

What is CBT?

Answer 24

• challenge the clients belief system
• Beck, 1975
• if negtive irrational beliefs of the self
• influences feeliungs and behaviour

Question 25

what are the three tyrpes of self talk?

Answer 25

1. Positive
   ○ “I can do it”, “keep going, hang on”
2. Instructional
   ○ “Keep your eyes on the ball”, “hips under”
3. Negative
   ○ “That was a bad shot”, “you’re going to lose”
   ○ Isn’t always bad for performance.
   ○ Some people respond well to it in isolation- may be motivational.

Question 26

what are the two types of organic self-talk?

Answer 26

• Organic
  ○ Spontaneous: natural thoughts that aren’t fixated on much- uninteded thoughts that come to the mind naturally
  ○ Goal-directed: rational response (makes sense) to spontaneous processes (self-regulation, preformance enhancement)

Question 27

what is trategic self talk?

Answer 27

Strategic: predetermined self-talk plans (what we respond well to) to trigger motivational/ instructional functions
Plan it into performance.

Question 28

how do individual differences influence self-talk?

Answer 28

• the type an individual needs
• preference
• experiences
• self-awareness

Question 29

hwo does culture influence self-talk?

Answer 29

Peters and Williams (2006) found that East Asians have significantly more negative self-talk than western Europeans (form of motivation)
Related to better performance

Question 30

how does coaching influence self-talk?

Answer 30

Negative coaching practices (authoritarian) (e.g., punishment) related to more negative self-talk (Zourbanos et al., 2010)

Question 31

what is thought stopping?

Answer 31

• An example of self talk (along with cue words)
• Not well researched- often criticised.
• Depends on the individual
  ○ Needs to be developmentally appropriate (age/skill level).
• A way to cope with negative thoughts
  ○ Way of avoiding emotions
• Using a trigger word or cue to stop the thought
  ○ E.g., stop, not now, hold (stop signs- visual)
• Can help thoughts that spiral
  ○ Over analysing the situation
• Should not be used as a long-term coping mechanism!
  ○ only use short term- the emotions are just been avoided and withheld of what might be causing them.

Question 32

how do you swap negative self-talk to positive self-talk?

Answer 32

• In Cognitive-Behavioural and Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy this is known as ‘reframing’ (REBT; Ellis, 1957)
  ○ REFRAMING
  ○ Rational schemas
• Thought -> feeling -> performance (e.g., behaviour) - key concept.
  ○ Cyclical relationship.
• Changing irrational beliefs to rational
  
  • Reframing negative self-talk, some tips:
    ○ Keep phrases short and specific- prevent attention loss
    ○ First person and present self- not thinking about other versions of the self.
    ○ Positive phrases- pick up on different words/ connotations to be more positive
    ○ Phrases with meaning- cue words, some phrases have more meaning than others, culture specific.
    ○ Speak kindly- be nice
    Repeat phrases often- use them in low pressure situations before high pressure ones to get used to them.