Lecture 1-Psychology of Sport/Exercise Flashcards
MST
mental skills training is the act of turning scientific information into actions for athletes.
Psychology definition:
“The scientific study of behaviour where behaviour is broadly defined”
Social Psychology definition
The scientific study of human social behaviour. The ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of human social behaviour
Sport/Exercise Psychology definition
The scientific study of human behaviour in the sport and exercise context. The ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of the sport and exercise context
All these branches of psychology, whilst different, are all analysis of….
behaviour of humans and the varying element is the context.
There are two questions generally asked in sport psychology
What effect do psych factors have on performance on sport/exercise?
What effect does the participation in sport/exercise have on an individual?
Psychology in sport
- Voluntary action of motivation through participation in sport.
- Competitive aspect of sport causing stress and emotion
- Evaluative activity
- Skill learning
- Participation with and also against people
- Rule bound activity
Psychology for sport
- This is different again; it is about learning how to apply psychology in a way that enhances performance. To be consistently good at sport you need psychological skills to maintain this.
There are three psych theories – all three of these theories are a result of the interaction between
behaviour, person, and the environment
- Psychoanalytic theories (Homo valen)
- striving human- these are unconscious, inner urges expressed as drives and emotions especially libido which is the act of a motivational force.
Who discovered the Psychoanalytic theories (Homo valen)
Freud and he was interested in this as our instincts are contradictory
example of the Psychoanalytic theories (Homo valen)
. An example of this could be the aggressive instinct.
Analagous to hardware and software. The hardware is the person and their genetics, the software is the person’s environment.
A person has a choice, they can choose to act on instincts or they can choose to ignore them.
B=f (P)
- Behaviour
-Function
-Person
- Behavioral theories (Homo mechanicus)
Talks about humans as reactive humans.
example of Behavioral theories (Homo mechanicus)
Analogous to a computer, a human is programmed (hardware) in a way to react consistently to certain kinds of input from the environment (software).
B=f (E)
-Environment
- Cognitive theories (Homo Sapien)
– the thinking human. A person thinks about a different environment but also brings their own motives, goals and beliefs to each environment and situation.
Cognitive theory more indepth:
There is a complex interaction between how the person interprets a situation and how they act on it. This is the social environment influencing behaviour. Thus, behaviour = a function of person x environment.
B=f (P x E)
What is ‘Sport’?
From a psychological perspective, sport is different compared to all other activities.
The question at hand is why we participate in sport which can often be painful, voluntarily?
Sport is something that makes us anxious because we care about it.
Sport definition
Sport is institutionalised, competitive activities that involve vigorous physical exertion or use of relatively complex physical skills
Sport is
“a structured, organised and institutionalised activity”
Sport is “a structured, organised and institutionalised activity” BUT
sport can be defined differently for everyone. Some people define sport by acknowledging it is an activity involving rules, shared goals, winners and losers, coaches and teams.
do you need opponents for sport
For sport, we need atleast ONE or otherwise multiple opponents to be able to call it a competition and determine that the element of competition is met.
Sport is hugely popular especially in westernised countries
This is evident through its high rates of participation, huge numbers of spectators, the media/broadcasting involved with sport and the business opportunities that sport provides.
What is ‘competition’?
When we compete we have a clear cut standard of excellence
The standard of excellence is clear because you know how well you perform based on the outcome. You know before you perform what the standard is. You are judged based on how well you meet this outcome.
Competition definition
A situation where a comparison of an individuals performance is made with some standard of excellence, in the presence of others who are aware of the criteria (standard) for comparison and can evaluate the competitive process
Key points of competition
-Performance standard
-Comparison process
-Social evaluation
