Psychology in Sports
The mind-body connection is a very powerful one. For everything you think in your mind, your body has a reaction, regardless of whether it is real or imagined. For example, have you ever had a bad dream? Usually, you will wake up and your heart is racing, you are sweating and very agitated, even though all you were doing was sleeping. But, in your mind there was something bad going on and your body was reacting to it. Here?s another example: if you are home alone and you hear a noise and interpret it as the wind, you are fine; but if you interpret it as a prowler, your fight or flight response takes over and you become fearful. Your heart begins going a mile a minute, your eyes dilate, and you are scared. These are just a few examples of how strong the connection is between your mind and your body. With this premise, it becomes unmistakable how necessary it is to train both the mind and body for 'peak performance'.
It was neat to see that, at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, there were approximately 20 Sport Psychology Consultants there working with athletes. It has also been noted that 1/3 of the golfers on the major tours work with a Sports Psychologist or Consultant. Slowly but surely athletes, teams, coaches and managers are not only saying that they feel sports is mental, but also they are doing something about it. They are hiring Sports Psychologists, reading books, and devoting time to team building and mental training.
In sports, so many things are left to chance. Sports are predictably unpredictable. Why let your mental mindset be another one of those things? There?s no reason for your mental game to be your one weakness! You have the power to control that. These tools and resources will help you remove psychological barriers that can get in the way of ??peak performance?? and give you some control over your own performance. Mark McGwire has worked with a Sports Psychologist since 1991, saying that the sessions help him find inner peace. He said it was totally his decision and the best one he made.
Up until about a decade ago, a Sports Psychologist or Consultant was considered a person who athletes went to see only when they had a problem, not someone who healthy and productive athletes and teams spent their time with.
Many outside the sports world never will know about the “real” things involved in sports. Sports are not just competitions between two opponents trying to claim they are more supreme than the other. There is more of a psychological aspect that most people miss all together sometimes. It is clearly evident with the information given that there is some sort of psychological aspect behind sports. Whether it may be the pre-game jitters the athletes may experience, the relationship each of them has with the stadium crowd, and the toll each match has on the their bodies. Sports psychology in general can be a difficult concept for many to understand. Before you diverge into that world however, one simple question remains “Are you tough enough to handle it?”
Performance psychology involves the process of facilitating the development of skills needed by the performer during his time to shine in a performance. Also, the process is almost entirely related to the events prior to the performance since they are the foundation of the desired result. This preparation involves practicing not only physically, but also mentally, psychologically, spiritually, and emotionally. In fact, the physical aspect of a performance has much less bearing than the mind and soul aspects. Tennis is a perfect example of this. No matter how much a player practices, if in the face of a match the player becomes too nervous, all of his body will freeze and will make unforced errors very easily. That used to happen quite often at the beginning of my matches until I managed to train my mind to stay focused on playing rather than winning. I also remember reading a book about tennis when I was about 8, and there was a question that said something like, “How much of a tennis match is technical, tactical, physical, and mental?” and several professional players answered by saying that the mental part contributes with just about the entire game. At first, since I had not experienced a real, challenging match before, I thought to myself, “No, that’s not right. It’s 25% each. It makes sense; it’s math”. Looking back I realize how silly my comment was because I had no idea what a true performance was like, and that the physical aspect although important, is more relevant in the preparation for a match. Any performance is made up of various smaller elements that each contribute to the big picture, just like the piece of a puzzle; however, each one has a unique placement that no other piece can fill in.
Sports psychology can be defined as the study and application of the attitudes and behaviors of athletes (including team athletes) that impact (either positively or negatively) performance in sports or competitive settings. The goal of sports psychology is to help athletes and teams identify unhealthy attitudes and beliefs, apply mental toughness skills and peak performance strategies to perform at optimal levels (Cohn). Sports psychology is not recognized as a traditional field of practice offered by graduate programs; although, it is a recognized field of specific study under Kinesiology and Physical Education Programs. Sports psychology was first founded in 1920 by Carl Diem in Berlin, Germany. Later on, in 1925, sport psychology was brought to the U.S by Cloman Griffith. These early psychologists aimed to observe the effects of mental state on different factors of performance such as reaction time, tension, relaxation, and awareness (Haney). In the 1960’s Griffith’s research interest in sports psychology reemerged after having faded away for a while; however, the field had a...
Baseball Hall of Famer and great Yogi Berra once said, “baseball is 90% mental and the other half physical. The psychology of baseball has always gone beyond the believed capabilities of all human beings and continues to stun scientists throughout the world. With the increase in physical abilities, athletes look towards professionals to find strength in their cognitive abilities to enhance their overall performance. Sports psychologists are also being used in order to aid athletes who have been struggling in either Minor or Major League Baseball. Sports psychology can help players from both the aspects of hitting and pitching by the use of techniques such as personal motivation, stress management, and visualization.
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 on performance. Anxiety has a significant affect on athletes and garners numerous research studies pertaining to performance.
However, what this argument does not take into account is that athletes have an abundance of pressure put on them that most non-athletes don’t ever experience. Hence, the saying, “go hard or go home”. A recent study emphasizes this fact as McClatchy notes, ”The researchers monitored mood levels of 465 collegiate athletes over three years and found 6.3 percent of the athletes met the criteria for clinically significant depression and 24 percent were considered ‘clinically relevant’ “ (2016). Studies like these prove that athletes are not blind to the idea of depression, but rather experience this disorder themselves. Anxiety has a huge role in depression. As sportsperson, there is constant effort to become an awe-inspiring player. As the stakes of the game raise, so does the anxiety. Some want a scholarship, some want to show off what they offer to a team that got a scholarship, and some are professionals. Regardless of whether it's grade school sport or a professional sport, failing at personal goals one set is down right depressing. Kearns and Hwang state that, ”While it’s not clear whether the source of challenges to a student-athlete's mental well-being is the same as those non-athletes, collegiate athletes are known to encounter unique stressor that the general population doesn’t have to deal with, such as the demands, relationships with coaches and missed scheduled classes” (2014). Pressure is something everyone experiences. However, athletes experience some of the same pressure that of non-athletes and then some. Being on a sports team is demanding to time and the idea of being “superior”. In athletics, coaches are everything. For example, If a coach likes how a person attributes as a team player, then that person will get a chance to shine. However, if the coach is not very fond of one, then the chances of opportunities are not very
I am a young ambitious student who strives to excel in everything I do. I want to study Sport Psychology as I know I possess the right skills to further and develop myself in the career of sports. I have the ability to understand others in sports as I also play sports myself. I have been in high pressured sporting situations which I have used my psychological skills to help increase my performance. What interests me in Sport Psychology is that I can make a big difference to not just my life but the lives of people in sport such as rehabilitating athletes or boosting athlete performance. I am fascinated by how different athletes perform in the same environment and getting practical with the mind, body and brain. Improving performance, consistency and stability in an athlete’s
...athletes. And because of the obvious problems with anxiety there have been a few key ways that show how treatment helps athletes out. So in final, after years of research on the effects of anxiety and treatment it is imperative that athletes get help from a professional in order to obtain maximum performance.
Playing a sport whether its basketball, soccer, football or any other of your interest can be thrilling, and accelerating. Not only can it be fun yet physical exercise is good for the mind, body, and spirit. Therefore, as an athlete one must keep in mind that playing any sport, injury is part of life and inevitable. Research has proven from time to time that severe injuries in sports can trigger psychological mental health issues, affecting them in their athletic performance.
A lot of times, sports seem like a contest of physical skill― a test to see who is the fastest or strongest, who has the best eye or the most endurance, who can jump the highest or can handle the ball the best. What a lot of people don’t know is that there is so much more to a sport than just the muscle and coordination. In order to excel in a sport, an athlete requires a lot of self-discipline, concentration, and self-confidence. It’s the mental factor that makes a difference. Former Olympic gold medal-winning decathlon runner Bruce Jenner once said, “You have to train your mind like you train your body” (Gregoire 1). Success or failure depends on the mental factors just as much as the physical ones. The training of the mind of an athlete is called sports psychology. The use of sports psychology has a huge impact upon an athlete’s performance. The mental skills of a sport are just as important as the physical skills. All professional athletes use sports psychology. “If they aren’t currently using it, it’s almost guaranteed they’ve used it in the past, even if they are unaware they have” (Davis, Stephens, The Exploratorium 129). It’s hard to find an experienced athlete who hasn’t used sports psychology, because without it, they probably wouldn’t be where they are. The use of sports psychology is a crucial step to becoming a successful athlete.
Wiese-Bjornstal, D. M., Smith, A. M., & LaMott, E. E. (1995). A model of psychological response to athletic injury and rehabilitation. Athletic training: Sport health care perspectives, 17-30.
Why are mental skills so important to performance and why are they often neglected by coaches and athletes? Yogi Berra has been quoted as saying, "sport is 90% mental and 50% physical." You can question his mathematical savvy, but if you're an athlete, coach or fan, you can't question his wisdom. (Hacker, 2000) Many athletes understand that while developing oneself to their physical potential is a critical element in performance potential, it is often a deficit in our psychological game rather than errors in our physical performance that keep us from performing at optimum levels in practice, games or matches. Spud McKenzie, the Budweiser poster puppy, suggested that it is important to say when, but also emphasized the critical element of knowing “when to say when”. It is often the successful athlete has recognized what needed to be done and the unsuccessful athlete was unable to do so. As a consequence, it is not the physical talents or abilities that separate athletes and teams, or successful versus less successful performance, rather, the psychological dimension that most frequently explains a given sport outcome or individual performance. For this reason games are played. Prior to each contest, judgment could be made with regard to which team or individual is the “more highly skilled”. If games were decided on who is the most physically gifted and/or talented individuals or teams, it would prove to be an exercise in futility to compete. As a result, whether you are an athlete or a coach, mastering the mental game of sport will allow you to achieve a level of success as a competitor than you could otherwise not achieve by focusing exclusively on the physical side of sport.
...ompetition environment. There is increasing recognition by the sports community that supporting athlete mental health is a vital aspect of competitive performance, and is as integral to success as the athlete’s physical abilities. The profession of sports psychology provides a very meaningful contribution to help facilitate athlete wellbeing and maximize the psychological skills required to compete at the highest level of competition.
In the article, “Athletes and Coaches Report Mental Health is Slightly More Important Than Physical Health in Overall Performance; Both Agree That More Communication is Needed to Address Mental Health Concerns.”, the Minds in Motion Depression Awarenes Campaign conducted a survey and found that the athletes and coaches believed that “mental health shares an equal, and/or slightly greater role than physical health, in defining peak athletic
Sport and exercise psychology is a mandatory aspect of the sport science discipline. This discipline contributes to the various professional practices associated with physical activities such as - teaching of physical education, recreation and health promotion, and kinesiology related professions - because it plays a mental role for the participants. Sport and exercise psychologists view physical activity in several different ways: physical activity as a tool for health, physical activity as a tool for human potential, and physical activity as a tool for social change. This aspect of psychology may be the most important aspect of physical activity, because of the contributions of exercise and sport psychology to health, human potential, and social change.