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Factors limiting sport performance
Effects of personality on sports performance
Effects of personality on sports performance
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Recommended: Factors limiting sport performance
Psychology usually assumes that people are pretty much the same but this neglects to consider significant differences between people. There are two keys subject areas in the study of human individual differences: personality and mental abilities; including the concept of intelligence.
Psychometric measurement enables us to examine both the common characteristics and the differences among people. Research into sports personality has been around since 1800’s
Jenkins (2005) defines personality as “a person’s characteristic patterns of behavior that contribute to his or her uniqueness”. In other words, personality is one of the psychological factors that make each individual different.
There are three main approaches in sports psychology that are used to explain personality and how it can affect sports performance: trait approach, situational approach and interactional approach.
We will review each of there theories, in order to try to work out whether or not personality affects sports performance.
TRAIT APPROACH
Eysenck and Cattell both developed theories based on the idea of traits. Those theories suggest that anyone’s personality is made of characteristics/traits that mostly define the way the individual will behave in a situation. Traits are defined as “a person’s predisposition to behave in a predictable way” (Jenskins, 2005). Eysenck and Cattell suggest that traits are relatively stables, long lasting characteristics and therefore enable us to predict someone’s behaviour.
Eysenck (1950) suggests that personality is “the sum-total of the actual or potential behavior-patterns of the organism, as determined by heredity and environment”. Eysenck developed a Personality Inventory (Eysenck and Eysenck, 1964) (se...
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...letes, nonlean sport athletes, and nonathletes on behavioral and psychological indices of eating disorders. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 8(2), pp.218-230
- Schurr, K.T., Ashley, M.A., and Joy, K.L., 1977. A multivariate analysis of male athlete characteristics: Sport type and success. Multivariate Experimental Clinical Research, 3, pp.53-68.
- Sword, L., 2002. The Gifted Introvert.
Available at: http://talentdevelop.com/articles/GiftIntrov.html [Accessed 19 April 2014].
- Talyabee, S. R., Moghadam, R. S. and Salimi, M., 2013. The investigation of personality characteristics in athlete and non-athlete students. European Journal of Experimental Biology, [online]
Available at [Accessed 19 April 2014].
- Weinberg, R.S., and Gould,D., 1995. Foundations of sport and exercise psychology. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics
One of the major theoretical areas in the study of the personality is the trait perspective. It suggests that individual personalities are comprised of broad dispositions, and it identifies and measures the characteristics that they are made up of (Cherry). The trait perspective helps to identify a person’s personality type (Myers). This perspective focuses on the difference between individual personalities and the traits that shape them.
This course has taught me a lot about the different personality theories as well as the best known psychology theorists that have developed these theories. Personality consists of the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that make an individual unique. Numerous theories have been emerged to implicit the different features of personality. The main purpose of some theories is to focus on explaining how personality developed.
An individual’s behaviour may differ depending on the circumstances they are in though there are definite signs of repetitive behaviour when placed in majority of the situations. These characteristics are known as traits which make up the personality of each person (Engler, 2014). Personality theorists do not have a mutual agreement on how the term personality should be used. They each have their definition of personality thus providing a large number of diverse personality theories (Engler, 2014). For example, Eysenck (1970) defined personality as a relatively permanent and consistent composition of an individual’s disposition that in turn establishes how the person adjusts to their
Wiese-Bjornstal, D. M., Smith, A. M., Shaffer, S. M., & Morrey, M. A. (1998). An intergrated model of resonse to athletic injury and rehabilitation. Journal of Applied Sports Psychology, 10, 46-69.
Peterson, Sherri L., J.C Weber, William W. Trousdale. "Personality Traits of Women in Team Sports vs. Women in Individual Sports." (pp. 324-329) Contemporary Readings in Sport Psychology. Ed. William P. Morgan. Charles Thomas: Springfield, 1970.
Personality is the individual differences in characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving. To me, personality means uniqueness. It is what sets us all apart from one another. Personality psychologist has coined five different traits into the Big Five. It consists of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. Extraverts are people who are relatively sociable and outgoing while on the opposite end individuals who are introverts are people who would much rather enjoy the company of close friends and family. People who are high in agreeableness are more likely to be trustworthy. Those who are high in conscientiousness are goal-oriented. Individuals high in neuroticism
Feist, J., & Feist, G. J. (2009). Theories of Personality (7th ed.). New York, New York: McGraw-Hill.
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
A person’s personality has been the subject of psychological scrutiny for many years. Psychologists have drawn up several theories in an attempt to accurately predict and determine one’s personality. Foremost amongst these, is the “Big Five Trait Theory” which stemmed from Raymond B. Cattell’s theory.
Magnavita, J. J. (2002). Theories of personality: Contemporary approaches to the science of personality. New York: Wiley.
Personality: An International Journal 41.4 (2013): 635-642. SPORTDiscus with Full Text. Web. 21 Jan. 2014.
In this article the researchers measured whether personality traits are associated with swimming as well as examining the concept that scores on some personality traits can have a reciprocal intermingled influence on other personality traits. They also studied on how gender can play a role in modulating personality. Personalities factors are determinates of psychological well-being and sports can and in fact do contribute to an individual’s well being thus affecting their personality factors. Sports can affect many personality traits and although there has been very little research on personality traits in regards to swimmers the research done in this article is very relevant and precise.
Sports psychology draws on knowledge from the fields of Kinesiology and Psychology. It involves the study of how psychological factors affect performance and how participation in sport and exercise affect psychological and physical factors. In addition to instruction and training of psychological skills for performance improvement, sport psychology may include work with athletes and coaches regarding injury, rehabilitation, communication, and team building (Weinberg, R.S. & Gould, D.,2010)....
The personality of the human brain can be a very curious thing to most. Over years of study, psychologists still debate and question how personality actually works. However, the theories of personality have been boiled down to just four major theories. Psychoanalytic, humanistic, trait, and social-cognitive. While none of these are perfect, they all have certain distinguishing characteristics, advantages, and drawbacks, that differ them from each other.
The study of personality theories of psychology is the section of psychology which studies individuals’ personalities and differences. A theory is a model that helps us predict or explain an outcome; in this case it is personality or behavior. Our personality is what makes us unique or different from other people. Many personality theorists may not feel the same about the development of personality or behavior but, they all are interested in the commonalities among people. How are people “put together,” how do they “work,” and how do they “fall apart.”