Social Facilitation

Question 1

What is social facilitation?

Answer 1

The audience has a positive affect/improves performance e.g. a hockey goal keeper plays better in front of a crowd

Question 2

What is social inhibition?

Answer 2

The audience has a negative affect/hinders performance e.g. a gymnast performs worse infant of a crowd

Question 3

What is an audience?

Answer 3

An audience can include anyone watching the performer e.g. crowd, coaches, opponents, teammates

Question 4

What is evaluative apprehension?

Answer 4

Arousal levels increase due to perceived judgement by audience

Question 5

What are the effects of an audience?

Answer 5

• the presence of an audience increases the performers level of arousal
• the impact of this is dependent on several factors
• in general, increased arousal leads to increased probability of dominant response

Question 6

The effects on personality

Answer 6

introverts - audience hinders/inhibits performance
extroverts - audience improves/facilitates performance

Question 7

The effects on the stage of learning

Answer 7

beginners/cognitive stage - audience has a negative effect - the dominant response is incorrect
expert/autonomous stage - audience has a positive effect - the dominant response is correct

Question 8

The effects on the type of skill

Answer 8

gross - positive effect, gross skills are better with high arousal e.g. shotput
fine - negative effect, fine skills are better with low levels of arousal e.g. darts
simple - positive effect
complex - negative effect, high levels of arousal have a negative effect on information processing

Question 9

How to limit the impacts of an audience

Answer 9

1. train infront of an audience - the use of selective attention (shutting out) the audience
2. use techniques to control arousal e.g. mental rehearsal, positive self talk, deep breathing, support from peers
3. groove skill - dominant response