arousal, stress and anxiety Flashcards
what is stress?
“A substantial imbalance between the physical and psychological demands placed on an individual and their response capability, under conditions where failure has importance consequences”
what is stage 1 of the stress process?
Environmental demands (physical and psychological)
what is stage 2 of the stress process?
Athlete perceives the “nature” of the demand
what are the 2 types of appraisal in stage 2 of the stress process?
• Primary appraisal: Is situation
“threatening” (& important) to
physical/psychological well-being (goals/values)?
• Secondary appraisal: Do I feel that I have the ability/ resources to successfully deal with demands of the situation?
what is stage 3 of the stress process?
Stress responses
If athlete feels that demands exceed coping capabilities, threat is perceived. what are the stress response’s as a result?
- Arousal
- Negative affect
- State Anxiety
- Loss of Focus/Attention
what is stage 4 of the stress process?
Behavioural consequences (i.e., performance outcome) associated with the stress response.
what are 3 categories of stressors?
• Competition Stressors:
e.g., opposition, injury, expectations
• Organisational Stressors:
e.g., finances, time, interpersonal relationships
• Personal Stressors:
e.g., family, friends
what are the 3 dominant forms of coping?
- Emotion-focused coping
- Problem-focused coping
- Avoidance coping
what is Emotion-focused coping?
Strategies designed to regulate emotional responses resulting from a
stressor. (e.g., seek emotional social support; positive reinterpretation &
growth)
what is Problem-focused coping?
Strategies designed to manage or alter the problem that is causing anxiety. (e.g., seek instrumental/informational social support; planning;
increased effort)
what is Avoidance-focused coping?
Strategies designed to avoid the stressor. (e.g., pass instead of shoot;
“hide” during competition)
what Arousal (activation) entail?
• Continuum of physiological and psychological activation( cognitive anxiety, somatic anxiety)
what are the symptoms of somatic anxiety?
heart rate, respiratory rate,
adrenal flow, muscular ‘electrical potential’
what are the 4 positive and negative affective states?
- E.g., Low Arousal = “I feel relaxed” (+ affect)
- E.g., Low Arousal = “I feel bored” (- affect)
- E.g., High Arousal = “I feel excited” (+ affect)
- E.g., High Arousal = “I feel scared” (- affect)
what is anxiety?
• Negative/unpleasant emotional/affective state
• Feeling of ‘nervousness’,
worry, and apprehension
• Associated with activation/arousal of the body
what is cognitive anxiety?
Worry, Self-doubt, Concern, Apprehension
what is competitive trait anxiety?
…stable personality disposition that describes an individual’s “tendency to perceive competitive situations as threatening and to respond to these
situations
Influences the way that people interpret/perceive
and respond to the same situation
what is cognitive and somatic state anxiety?
Cognitive state anxiety
• Intensity and frequency of momentary worries and concerns
Somatic state anxiety
• Intensity and frequency of perceived unpleasant physiological response to threatening situation
what is perceived control state anxiety?
The degree to which one has the resources and ability to meet challenges.
what is drive theory?
most likely response will occur if arousal increases (depends on ability, skill type personality)
what is inverted U theory?
best performance occurs at mid arousal (depends on personality, skill type and ability)
what are the problems with the inverted U theory?
- How would you explain a sudden crash in performance?
- Focuses only on physiological arousal (not anxiety).
- Assumes that everyone’s IPS is associated with a moderate level of arousal.
what is the individual zone of optimal functioning (IZOF) theory?
different people perform best at different levels of anxiety:
athlete A: low anxiety level
athlete B: moderate anxiety level
athlete C: high anxiety level
how do you find an athlete’s IZOF?
• IZOF is established using an intra-individual assessment protocol based
on multiple observations.
• Multiple measures of pre-competition A-state and corresponding performance measures.
performance measures for IZOF?
- Subjective athlete rating.
- Subjective coach rating.
- Objective measures?
practical IZOF issues?
• Takes a long time given need for multiple assessments.
- Difficulty getting “valid” measures of performance.
- Need considerable expertise to identify performance-anxiety (arousal) zones
(…presence of “outliers”)
…establishing IZOF for the combination of cognitive and somatic scores is much more complicated.
- Hanin’s original IZOF model was based on a “unidimensional” assessment of A-state
- How do we track/control differences in “event importance”?
- This is an exercise in athlete self-awareness
what is attentional focus?
• Concentration of mental effort on sensory or mental events (Solso, 1995).
- Focus on relevant environment cues
- Maintain attentional focus over time
- Shifting attentional focus when necessary
what are the 3 attentional focus?
too broad attentional field= low arousal
optimal attentional field=moderate arousal
too narrow attentional field= high arousal
attentional focus-broad and external?
used to rapidly assess a situation
attentional focus-broad and internal?
used to analyse and plan
attentional focus-narrow and external?
used to focus exclusively on one or two external cues
attentional focus-narrow and internal?
used to mentally rehearse an upcoming performance or control and emotional state
what is the catastrophe model?
used to highlight that past a certain level of arousal your performance dramatically worsens, but can improve if removed from situation and reduce arousal.
facilitative/debilitative anxiety (positive)
stressor-yes, can control-view anxiety as facilitative
facilitative/debilitative anxiety (negative)
stressor-no, can’t control-view anxiety as debilitative
