CHAPTER 2:  HUMAN CHARACTERISTICS INFLUENCING SP&EX BEHAVIOR

 

 

COMPETITIVE ANXIETY

 

·      Arousal, as the intensity dimension of behavior, is the general state of activation ranging on a continuum from deep sleep to extreme excitement.

·      The cognitive component of anxiety typically involves worrying about performance evaluation or possible failure. 

·      Common physiological measures of anxiety are heart rate, respiration rate, blood pressure, and galvanic skin response. 

·      Behavioral measures typically take the form of self-report measures, such as the state anxiety inventory of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory by Spielberger and associates. 

·      Other sport-specific measures on anxiety include a uni-dimensional Sport Competition Anxiety Test (SCAT) and a multidimensional Competitive State Anxiety Inventory – 2 (SCAI-2) which assesses cognitive worry and somatic anxiety on separate scales.

 

Hans Selye (1956)  referred to bodily reactions to stress as the General Adaptation Syndrome – the “fight or flight” response of the autonomic nervous system that we all experience in stressful situations.

 

Drive Theory (Hull & Spence)  proposes that as drive increases (as when one is facing competition), learned responses are more likely to occur.  The basic relationship is linear; as arousal increases, performance increases.  In other words, performance (P) is a function of habit (H) times drive (D).  Drive is essentially arousal, or the intensity of dimension of behavior.  The other main component, habit, refers to learned responses or behaviors.  The more a response has been reinforced, the greater its habit strength and the more likely it will occur.

 

Inverted-U Theory (Yerkes & Dodson)  proposes that performance is optimal at a moderate level of arousal and that performance declines as arousal increases or decreases from that moderate, optimal level.

 

 

 

Martens’ Model of Competitive Anxiety is built on the following four major guidelines:

 

1. Interaction Approach.  Individual differences in competitive anxiety are easy to see, and situational factors play a role.  To understand competitive anxiety, we must consider the person, the situation, and the ongoing interactive process.
2. State-Trait Anxiety Distinction.  Trait anxiety is the tendency to become anxious in stressful situations (a personality disposition).  State anxiety is the actual state of apprehension and tension at any given moment (an emotional response).
3. General versus Specific Anxiety.  Although high-trait-anxious persons tend to become anxious in stressful situations, they may not become equally anxious in all situations.  One person may become overly anxious in competitive sport, but remain clam in academic exams.  Following that line of thought, Martens proposed a need for sport-specific trait anxiety measures for predicting a state anxiety in competitive sports.  Competitive trait anxiety is a tendency to perceive competitive situations as threatening and to respond to these situations with feelings of apprehension or tension.
4. Competition Process.  We want to do well and we worry about performing poorly.  But everyone does not worry to the same extent.  Competitive trait anxiety affects our perceptions of threat and subsequent anxiety through the subjective competition situation, which is the cognitive appraisal process that is so central to all emotion.

 

Reversal Theory of Anxiety  holds that the relationship between arousal and affect depends on one’s cognitive interpretation of arousal.  High arousal may be interpreted positively (excitement) or negatively (anxiety).  Low arousal may be interpreted positively (relaxation) or negatively (boredom).

 

Catastrophe Model of Anxiety  suggests that as arousal increases, performance increases up to a point (as in inverted-U), but as arousal gets beyond the optimal level, performance drops abruptly as the athlete goes over the edge – a catastrophe.  Moreover, the athlete who has gone over the edge and tries to regain control, to return to an optimal level, cannot simply go back on the same path.  Instead, he or she must go back to much lower anxiety levels to get on track and then gradually guild up again.

 

·      Interactive Effects.  The model proposes that high competitive anxiety will lead to enhanced performance when physiological arousal is low (e.g., days before competition) but to impaired performance when physiological arousal is high (e.g., on game day).  Combination of low physiological arousal and high cognitive anxiety leading to better performance than low physiological arousal and low cognitive anxiety.  However, the combination of high physiological arousal and high cognitive anxiety led to worse performance than that of high physiological arousal and low cognitive anxiety.

·      Facilitative versus Debilitative Effects.  Cognitive anxiety can sometimes enhance performance and not are not always debilitating.  Specifically, the model predicts that performers’ best performances should be better, and their worst performances worse, when they perform under high cognitive anxiety than under low cognitive anxiety. 

·      Hysteresis Effects.  Hysteresis is a mathematical term, and in terms of the model, it implies that the graph of performance against physiological arousal follows a different path when arousal is increasing than when arousal is decreasing.  Performance increases as arousal increases until arousal hits that peak when performance suddenly drops off sharply.  Hysteresis explains the sudden drop-off or choking phenomenon, and the differing paths have implications for practical issues related to control and recovery.  Recovery will be faster if cognitive anxiety and physiological arousal are addressed simultaneously.  Thus, a multimodal stress management approach must be employed by coaches and sport psychologists.

 

 

 

References:

Cox. R.H.  (2002).  Sport psychology: Concepts and applications.  (5^th ed.).  Boston, MA:  McGraw Hill.

Gill, D.L.  (2000).  Psychological dynamics of sport and exercise.  (2^nd ed.).  Champaign, IL:  Human Kinetics.

Weinberg, R. & Gould, D.  (1999).  Foundations of sport and exercise psychology.  (2^nd ed.).  Champaign, IL:  Human Kinetics.

Williams, J.M. (Ed.).  (2001).  Applied sport psychology: Personal growth to peak performance.  Mountain View, CA:  Mayfield Publishing Company.