Social facilitation and inhibition Flashcards
(12 cards)
What is social facilitation?
Increase in performance due to the presence of others
What is social inhibition?
Decrease in performance due to the presence of others
What factors affect social facilitation and inhibition?
- skill type
- performer level = novice vs expert
- personality
- playing home or away
- evaluation apprehension
- proximity/size of the audience
What is the coaction effect?
Presence of an audience or coactors (other performers) increase the arousal level of the performer
Increased arousal = dominant response more likely to occur
How does level of performer affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Novice = better without audience (interference with production of skill – dominant response incorrect)
Experienced = better with audience (motivating – dominant response correct)
How does home field advantage affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Home team has an advantage due to:
- large number of home supporters
- surrounding familiarity
- home players more comfortable
- no travelling prior to game
Disadvantaged if away due to unfamiliar/hostile environment
How does personality type affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Type A personality = perform better in the presence of others
Type B = perform better without presence of others
Extroverts = seek out situations with high arousal levels so perform better with audience
Introverts = have high RAS levels so perform better without audience
How does skill type affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Gross/simple skills = require higher arousal and presence of an audience often facilitating performance
Fine/complex skills = nature usually require a high degree of concentration and can be affected by audience noise
How does proximity/size of audience affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Closer audience or larger crowd = increased arousal occurs – positive effect on performance due to motivation effort and determination
however can increase anxiety (cause over arousal) = decrease in performance
What is evaluation apprehension and give an example?
Audience can be perceived as evaluating and therefore causes anxiety and arousal
e.g a potential scout or selector
How does evaluation apprehension affect social facilitation and inhibition?
Social facilitation = arousal/anxiety increases due to being judged by others increasing motivation/determination and raise performance
Social inhibition = arousal/anxiety increases due to being judged by others leading to decreased performance
What are strategies to combat social inhibition and evaluation apprehension?
- selective attention = only attend to relevant cues (not audience)
- mental rehearsal = block out audience so don’t distract performer
- practice in front of audience = get used to it decreasing negative effect
- over learn skill = become dominant response
- positive self talk = block out negative thoughts associated with audience
- positive reinforcement = reduce anxiety associated with audience
