Competitive Anxiety in Sports Performance

Have you ever felt an overwhelming feeling of fear or nervousness, prior to competing in an important event? Did it affect your ability to perform? If so, you may be familiar with performance anxiety. An athlete suffering from performance anxiety often will perceive competitive situations as threatening, which can result in feelings of apprehension, fearfulness and tension (Patel, Omar, Terry, 2010). Interestingly, studies have found the prevalence of sport-related performance anxiety to be much higher in female athletes than male athletes (Thatcher, Thatcher,

For many years, the mental aspect of sports performance has received considerable attention in sports psychology. The cognitive processes in elite and less skilled athletes have been studied extensively, in an attempt to shed light on the variables arbitrating task execution during performances (Beilock, Carr, Machon & Starkes, 2002). This essay investigates how cognition differs in elite and less skilled athletes. Firstly, it considers elite-novice- differences in attentional focus; which suggests that where athletes direct their attention while performing differs across skills. Moreover, the essay closely examines the difference in elite and novice athletes ' ability to make effective decisions during performances (Milazzo, Farrow, Ruffault & Fournier, 2016).

For some athletes, sports can be a good way to cope with stress. When they hit the court or the field, they feel as if all of their worries from that day vanish. But for others, sports can be how a person identifies his or herself and where they derive most of their self-esteem. So that moment when you realize something in your body or your mind isn’t right, you push through it and tell yourself it will go away. But sometimes the pain gets worse. So you have two

Brown explores the influence of media expectations on athletes by way of questionnaire and performance answered by different athletes. Each participant in the study was given two different scenarios, to perform their sport with the media representatives presents and not present. In conclusion, Brown did not find a significant effect on self-confidence or performance during his study. Furthermore, since performance did not change, there was no surprise when Brown did not find any change in self-confidence either since both are closely correlated.

Before exploring the health of an athlete its important to understand what mental health is. Mental health is characterised by emotional wellbeing and resilience to stress (ClearingHouseForSport Australian Government Ralph Richards 9th June 2016). Mentally healthy individuals are able to cope with daily stresses and fully participate in family, work and in this case sport activities. A mental disorder is a diagnosable illness that affects a persons thinking, emotional state and behaviour and disrupts his/her ability to carry out normal daily activities and maintain personal relationships. Exercise has many benefits, not only for physical health but also your mental health as well. In the brain, exercise stimulates chemicals that improve an

Sports—which involve emotion, competition, cooperation, achievement, and play—provide a rich area for psychological study. People involved in sports attempt to master very difficult skills, often subjecting themselves to intense physical stress as well as social pressure. research has expanded into numerous areas such as imagery training, hypnosis, relaxation training, motivation, socialization, conflict and competition, counseling, and coaching. Specific sports and recreational specialties studied include baseball, basketball, soccer,

Granito Jr. and Vincent J. did a study in 2002 over the psychological response to athletic injury. The purpose of their study was to describe the athletic injury experience, focusing on differences between male and female athletes. 31 injured athletes (15 male and 16 female) were interviewed about their athletic injury. Each participant went through an interview process, consisting of an in-depth interview and follow-up telephone interviews. The interview data were analyzed, and compared between the male and female athletes. The results showed that female athletes tended to perceive the coaches as much more negative with respect to how the coach treated them following their injury; were less likely to talk about a significant other (boyfriend/girlfriend); and were more concerned about how the injury would influence their health at a future point. Conclusions focused on possible explanations and how the results fit into the current theory for the psychological response to injury for each gender.

The beneficial aspects of participating in sports are often noted but there is another side that cannot be ignored. Mental health issues among elite athletes is a topic of increasing interest and public awareness. Sport-related factors such as injury, overtraining and failure in competition are showing to influence the prevalence of mental health issues in elite athletes. Whatever the cause or reason mental health issues and concerns cannot be ignored. High performance athletes need to be provided with mental health support, despite the negative stigma of mental health issues and the concept of mental toughness in athletes. In the past, there has been a “widespread assumption has existed within the sporting world that only emotionally and mentally strong athletes are able to complete at the highest levels. Psychological disorders, such as depression, were thought to infrequently occur among elite athletes” (Hammond et al, 2013, pg.276) There may actually be an increased risk for mental health issues in athletes as they are less likely to; seek treatment, reveal symptoms, are more accustomed to work through pain, fear of showing signs of weakness and may not have developed healthy coping mechanisms to deal with failure. In addition, many athletes have not developed their identity outside of being an athlete and therefore if this role is threatened by injury or illness, they may experience a significant sense of loss. Treating a psychological ailment in athletes should be given as much importance as treating a physical

There are cross-sectional and longitudinal data in support of the belief that loss in the form of chronic competitive failure can elicit changes in athletic identity. First, suggesting that doing poorly in sport may differentially affect athletes as a function of their level of athletic identity, Cutler and Meyer (1995) demonstrated that individuals who were strongly identified with the athlete role and were dissatisfied with their progress in sport had lower self-esteem than individuals less invested in the athlete role who were also dissatisfied with their progress in sport. Second, Fish et al. (1997) found that athletes who were not selected for an elite squad decreased their athletic identity, while athletes who were selected maintained

For High Performance athletes, there can be a lot riding on their results and performance in competition. If athletes develop an over-reliance on sporting success as a source of self-worth and identity, it can lead to serious emotional issues if things do not go as desired. Athletes often identify their self-worth with their ability to perform, and performance failure has been significantly associated with depression (Taylor, 2015 pg.11; Troijan, 2016, pg. 137) Athletes face many struggles and when something goes wrong it can leave them not knowing where to turn for help. They can be left with they feelings that they are nothing, undeserving, and alone. This may also exacerbate their feelings of seclusion, depression, or grief. Most athletes

Martinant and Ferrant (2007) aim to comprise clusters of athletes based on their anxiety and to compare them on their levels of perfectionism and self confidence. The authors used the Competitive State Anxiety Inventory - 2 and Sport-multidimensional perfectionism scale to gather results. The results determined five different clusters of athletes based on anxiety criteria. The subgroups not only separated by anxiety intensity and frequency, but also by direction of anxiety. For example, the anxious debilitators contained athletes with high somatic and cognitive anxiety levels with low anxiety direction, which resulted in a debilitating effect. Interestingly, the anxious facilitator group endured the same level of intensity and frequency, but directed their

competitive advantage. Hence, it is essential to study mental toughness and other psychological characteristics of the athletes.

Have you ever thought to yourself before a game ‘wow I’m going to lose”, “I’m not good enough”, “I’m terrible at this” which was overexaggerating and de-motivating? Negative self-talk can affect your performance whether this is a decrease in your enjoyment, increase in your frustration and cause you to have increased stress or anxiety about your performance. The positive aspect about negative thoughts is that it is a learned behaviour which can be changed because if you can learn to be negative you can learn to be positive. The beneficial effect of self-talk on cognitive anxiety is consistent with theoretical statements that self-talk is the core of anxiety. Also, findings that by reducing negative or anxious self-talk results in less anxious states. This makes a lot of sense as have you ever been down on yourself and suddenly either yourself or someone else has said “you need to stop this and be happier” and all of a sudden, your entire mood changes and you are. One way to stop negative self-talk is to recognise your negative thought, have a cue to stop you whether this be saying “stop” or “no” and then take a deep breath and replace it with a rational, constructive thought.

The correlation of playing competitive sports at college level and self esteem are measured. Subjects were given the Barksdale self esteem questionnaire to fill out and levels of self esteem are measured by scores out of one hundred. The subjects are then separated into categories determined by gender and whether they played sports at the college level. The results indicated that the elite athletes have a higher self esteem than non athletes. The survey also revealed that women have a slightly higher self esteem than men. These findings agree with our hypothesis that athletes will have a higher level of self esteem than non athletes will.

Children who participate in sports are developing rapidly in sports skills, sportsmanship, and psychologically, but does this come from organized sports are just nature’s process. Children develop emotional and social benefits from participating in sports. Children experience character and leadership development through peer relations leading to an increase in self-esteem and a decrease in anxiety levels. Children will get opportunities to experience positive and negative emotions throughout their practice and games trials. It is important for the coach to understand the “psychology of youth sports and physical activity participation” (Weinberg & Gould, 2011 p.516).