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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.
Surprisingly, physical skills are only a small factor of the sport. The mental aspect of the sport needs to come into play, because the physical aspect can only take you so far. A lot of
Romo 2 athletes are physically talented and train hard. But what separates the good athletes from the best is simply their mental strength (Gregoire 1). Someone could be the most talented at...
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...the javelin a greater distance, or jumping the highest bar. Some of them spend more time thinking about the event than they do practicing it. Because they believe it will work, it works” (Olney 5). Most often, when an athlete visualizes the outcome they want, that’s exactly what they end up doing. The brain is getting trained for actual performance. Imagery can enhance motivation, confidence, prime your brain for success, and increase states of flow (Gregoire 2). During visualization, athletes incorporate all of the skills that they perform in their sport in great detail before their event. It helps them have a general image in their mind of how they are going to perform, and gives them a more confident and positive attitude towards it.
Once athletes get their mind and body working together, strange, almost superhuman things can happen. Some athletes claim
An example of this is in the essay Confessions of a doper by Jonathan Vaughters. When playing sports you have to have the “resolve” to do it as said in the essay.(8) Physical strength is not only physical ability but also, self centeredness. For those who do not have much physical prowess in sports, the mind evens the playing field. The mind opens up opportunities where we once believed there were none. With critical thinking we can overwhelm even the most worthy opponents. There are some methods of self defense that do not matter if you are the smallest in your class or age group. Tickery, mind games and quick thinking let you outsmart most
Practicing meditation daily or before a game builds mental strength. Scientists have proven that meditation improves many cognitive functions not only in athletes, but in everyday life, “Emerging scientific literature further suggests that mindfulness meditation is a productive method for improving self awareness” (David and Hayes 198) Another way that athletes can mentally prepare themselves is by visualizing the outcome that they would like before an event. This makes that outcome seem more realistic to them and closer in reach. This is called imagery. “Imagery has been described as a mental event that recreates actual experience and is frequently adopted by athletes as a covert rehearsal technique to aid both motoric and psychological performance.” (Parker et al. 22) . If you go into a game or match with the mindset that you are going to lose, you will not play to the best of your
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.
Creative new training methods, developed by coaches, athletes and sport scientists, are aimed to help improve the quality and quantity of athletic training ( Kellmann, 2010, p.1). However, these methods have encountered a consistent set of barriers including overtraining ( Kellmann, 2010, p.1). Due to these barriers, the need for physical and mental recovery in athletics brought an increasing attention in practice and in research ( Kellmann, 2010, p.1).
Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology 12.3 (Sept 1990): 217-222. Edwards, Tara and Hardy, Lew. “The Interactive Effects of Intensity and Direction of Cognitive and Somatic Anxiety and Self- Confidence Upon Performance.” Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology18.4 (Sept 1996): 296-312. Ferraro, Tom.
Sports Psychology Today. Mental Edge Athletics, 4 Sept. 2012. Web. 28 Oct. 2013. Forde, Pat.
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
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.
(munroe, K., Giacobbi, P., Hall, C., & Weinberg, R. (2000) A study done in the United States Olympic training centre showed that 100% of the sport psychology consultants and 90% of the athletes used a form of imagery, 97% of the athletes believed that it helped them with their performance. 94% of the coaches of the Olympic athletes had used imagery in their training sessions with the athletes, with that 20% of the athletes used it in every training session they had (pg 297) (Murphy, S., Jowdy, D., & Durtschi, S. 1990). While most of the research has shown on practiced imagery the athletes are using imagery for competition mostly in pre-competition. Athletes use imagery all the time they use it durning and after training, outside of training and before, durning and after a competition.
Mental toughness is a group of personal characteristics and attributes that helps a person work through tough circumstances. This term is mostly utilized in sports when trying to get through a hard situation. For example, if an athlete is attempting to come back from a loss in a game. Another instance would be trying to get through a rough practice, where nothing is going your way, but still having the mindset that you will get through it and get better. Coaches and Sport Commentators uses the term mental toughness to describe the mental state of athletes who persevere through difficult sport circumstances to succeed.
Slide 2: Sport psychology is a proficiency that uses psychological knowledge and skills to address optimal performance and well-being of athletes, developmental and social aspects of sports participation, and systemic issues associated with sports settings and organizations. APA recognizes sport psychology as a proficiency acquired after a doctoral degree in one of the primary areas of psychology and licensure as a psychologist. This proficiency should not be confused with those who have earned a doctoral degree in sport psychology, but are not licensed psychologists. Coaches shouldn’t tell a dancer to be confident or relax because it can cause a dancer to become frustrated and they won’t have the focus that they need. Dancers need practical
According to Damon and his colleague, teams and individuals can attain greater consistent levels of confidence if it is based on performance as opposed to outcome. Scholars argue that performance goals are flexible and in apposition to enable athletes to be in control. Progressive achievement in performance will propel athletes to goals achievement and improve motivation. Eventually, their success will be manifested in their tremendous performance which will also attract higher levels of self-confidence. Contrary, the sports people with outcome confidence often believe that higher performance could allow them to improve their social image. All this confirms that the success in sports is integrated with the levels of self-confidence, performance, and outcome. However, it is advisable for athletes and other sports people to focus on their performance but not their outcomes if there is need to improve their skills for the sake of goals
Sports psychology continues to evolve in order to ensure that comprehensive and evidence-based psychological services are available for athletes and teams. Giving athletes an understanding of their psychological functioning, and building the ability to implement a range of psychological strategies in competition enables athletes to both execute their skills and thrive under pressure as they strive to reach their performance potential.
When competing in a sport, the performance of the athlete can be compromised if he or she doesn’t maintain a healthy lifestyle. While staying physically fit and exercising are important in any athlete’s daily routine, there are other factors to determine a “healthy” lifestyle. Similarly, an athlete should practice good sportsmanship while competing. Respect for a fellow athlete is the root of every great athlete. In order to perform well at any sport, an athlete has to enjoy the game. Take soccer for instance, if a soccer player does not enjoy playing soccer, then it will be significantly harder to perform at his or her best. Along with enjoying and respecting the sport, an athlete has to have the mindset of a champion. Thinking like a perfect athlete will provide the motivation and determination to achieve the goals of a perfect athlete. Consider Bruce Lee, a world renown martial artist and fighter. Lee is known as one of the greatest martial artist in history and is respected for his methods. “If you always put limits on what you can do, physical or anything else, it’ll spread over into the rest of your life”, Bruce stated. “It’ll spread into your work, into your morality, into your entire being. There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.” Bruce Lee tells how the proper mindset is
Motivate the motivation, simple words that can mean some much to an athlete, but what is motivation really? In the games and sports, psychological and physiological factors play an important role in determining the performance level (Grange & Kerr, 2010; Schilling & Hyashi, 2001). Motivation also plays an important role in determining the performance level an athlete, but plays a role in the psychological and physiological factors as well. Motivation is more than a behavior or idea, it is an impact on how we interact with others, how we process defeat, feel, and how we play. Motivation will not only help an athlete get the starting position or gain an award but more importantly, help an athlete reach their potential. Motivation like most things