Essay on Athletes and the Effects of Pre-Game Jitters

Society calls for athletes to give flawless performances in the stadiums and arenas. The fans have grown accustomed to high flying, hard hitting shows of athleticism and finesse, and oftentimes an athletes success gains them a elevated status in society with special privileges that you and I can only dream of. As there careers get bigger and bigger they fell that they should be shown a certain respect by fans when not on the field, and many athletes become angered when

The present review will analyze and critique five empirical sport psychology-related research articles. Moreover, the discussion of each article will include which statistical method was used, why it was used, and whether or not it was appropriate for the data. In addition, the article discussion will include a description and possible critique of the author’s interpretations of the results.

Competition is a unique situation in life to analyze. If you can focus on the small details outside of the game, there’s a possibility that you can understand the way an athlete is performing and why a coach is behaving a certain way. In the heat of the moment, if not properly trained, one can not perform to their potential due to the pressure that the moment of competition can place on an individual. This can be just as much for coaches and how they react and act as much as it goes for player. Effective coaches know how to use the situation to their advantage and know what to do or how to react at the appropriate time. In this paper, I’ll examine the competition of the University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh Titans and the St. Thomas Tommies in a NCAA Division 3 playoff game. I’m watching this game from the UW-Oshkosh side, so I will be observing the UW-Oshkosh football team for the most part. With this competition between UW-Oshkosh and St. Thomas, I’ll break down this paper into four talking points and the effects of said points. These four points are pre-competition routine, feedback and reinforcement by coach, game flow and interruptions and then other thoughts and factors that I noticed during the game.

Our thoughts, diet/nutrition, exercise, rest, environment and physiology have a positive or negative impact on us which affects how well we perform and feel. In the world of sports, this is very easy to demonstrate because the mind/body connection provides you with immediate feedback. When you are positive, your performance excels. When you are negative, your performance is adversely affected. With various types of distress, or

What these players fail to realize is that some kids can't handle the gaze of the crowd that watches the game, and that these kids can't focus on the game. Instead, these players focus on the gazes of the people and the comments the crowd makes; this can cause players to become extremely nervous and more likely to do nothing, and end up playing poorly. In an article written by Mark Hyman and Nathan Pitcock, writers for the New York Times, they state “More than a third said they had been yelled at or teased by fans; fifteen percent said their parents get angry when they play poorly" (Pitcock, Hymen 1). This quote shows that the player’s fear of preforming poorly, and how others may react to their performance, can cause young athletes to feel bad about themselves. Fans comments can affect the player’s confidence and their performance when they get worked up over what coaches and parents say. The pressure put on these young athletes can be too much and overwhelm them, which takes the joy out of the

Sports is known to have a multitude of psychosomatic effects on our physical and mental being, all the way from reducing stress, muscular anxiety to improving positive thoughts, confidence and giving you a toned body. It also has the added bonus of harvesting a sense of accomplishment and adventure in our lives. Since all of us can’t be NFL, Giants or Patriots material, we can use the primitive tools to invest in our metal and physical health by engaging in sports as fitness routines. Depending on your current physical state, location and time, you can always schedule one on one, or team gatherings to participate in out-door sports for quality down time.

Hardy, L., Jones, G., Gould, D. (2000)Understanding Psychological Preparation for SportChichester: John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Few within the realm of competitive athletics would argue with the importance of being mentally prepared prior to an athletic competition as well as the need to maintain that particular mindset during a competitive contest. Nevertheless, recent research has shown that many athletes, coaches, and sporting administrators are still quite reluctant to seek out the services of a qualified sport psychologist, even if they believe it could help. One of the primary reasons for this hesitation appears to be a lack of understanding about the process and the mechanisms by which these mental skills affect performance. Unlike the “harder sciences” of sport physiology and biochemistry where athletes can see the tangible results in themselves or other athletes (e.g., he or she lifted weights, developed larger muscles, and is now stronger/faster as a result) (Gee, Chris J (2010): 386-402.) Using sports phycology has been found to give athletes multiple benefits, such as improvement, and that athlete being able to understand how to develop a growth and or positive mindset. Lastly another way that has been found to improve athletes is taking mental repetitions for their sport. One of the keys to Jeff’s improvement over the years, and certainly a key to him making a roster in the NFL, is his ability to take mental reps. The champion mindset recognizes

I agree every athlete deals with some sort of anxiety. I can understand how anxiety can be over came by being though methods. An athletes mental toughness can be decided how they conquer there state of mind. I mention about how watching game tape before a game help me with anxiety about not preforming at the top level.

Many athletes would agree that they have felt butterflies in their stomach or a sudden rush of adrenaline before an important game. This feeling can either translate into legendary performances or monumental failures. According to Sharon D. Hoar (2007), to fully comprehend anxiety’s effect on performance, one must understand the discrimination between two unique sets of sources: trait and state anxiety, and cognitive and somatic anxiety. Anxiety symptoms are numerous and unique to every athlete. Hoar suggests that athletes might report cognitive symptoms (eg. Inability to focus), somatic symptoms (eg. Sweaty palms), or both. The author discusses a variety of sources of anxiety and argues that it can have both positive and negative effects

As spectators we are normally passive onlookers of the action taking place. The only influence we can have over the outcome is by making the participants aware of our support by cheering, or of our anger and frustration at an action by chanting and booing. We place our trust in the officials and referees to ensure that strict guidelines and rules are adhered to throughout the action. As spectators we are also commentators expressing our opinions regarding the actions of the participants and the officials. As spectators we can empathise with the emotions of the participants and feel extreme jubilation or extreme disappointment depending on whether you are supporting the winning or losing side. In this essay I will be discussing whether the

I recently noticed how a coaches frustration and stress can affect the performance and mentality of athletes. When a coach gets upset or demands a lot from her or his athletes you can see a clear change in the athletes focus, anxiety, and style of play. When coaches demand performance be improved by their athletes because they are loosing a game it clearly goes against the athletes first, winning second philosophy. It also places a huge amount of stress on the athletes trying to focus on not making mistakes instead of focusing on the game at hand. You can see a change in the athletes play, they don’t take the same chances, they seem to committee errors on plays they normally easily make, and their enjoyment of the game is gone. They stop focusing on their training and focus more on trying to not committee

Put yourself in an athlete’s shoes. Imagine you are sitting on the sideline watching an intense game. It’s your favorite sport and you are missing out on the action. You had your chance to shine and you blew it. Error after error, the coach pulled you out of the game. You don’t feel great, right?

If you have close friends around you that you can talk to, do so it will help you get your confidence up. Or it might take the butterflies out of your stomach. Sometimes before a game you will start to think about all of the bad things that could go bad in the game. But if you talk to your friends it usually will take the thoughts of messing up in the game away and you will feel better about. When athletes allow their focus of concentration to jump ahead to the future, or drift back to the past, the result is always an increase in their nervousness. If you want to stay cool and calm in the clutch, then you have to train yourself to keep your focus in the NOW — especially during your games, matches or races! This means that leading up to the

Goal-setting and pre-performance routines are two effective and relatively simple psychological interventions that have been shown to improve individual and team output (Ashnel, 2013). Pre-performance routines (PPR) are of particular interest because of the ease of application and variety of functions. A pre-performance routine can be applied seconds, hours, or days before and event (depending on the needs of the athlete or team). In addition to a temporal variability, there are wide ranges of psychological interventions that can be utilized in a pre-performance routine catering to the individual or team preferences.