Stress is an imbalance between that demands that someone feels and his or her feelings of capably to meet that demands - when failure of these demands has important consequences. Arousal can affect performance in many ways. There are several theories as to how stress affects performance.
These are summarized in the following:. Some people perform their best with low anxiety, some with a medium amount and others with a high amount.
Anxiety felt by the body will have an effect on performance much like that of the inverted U theory see above. However, there is little support for this theory. If there is a high level of anxious thoughts worry , performance will be better at a medium level of physical arousal but will suddenly drop off and become very poor. There is a breaking point when performance decreases dramatically.
Arousal can be interpreted as pleasant and exciting and as unpleasant and anxious. State Anxiety often abbreviated as A-state is a temporary thing — anxiety that fluctuates over time.
It involves a person having a sense of apprehension or tension, usually because of a particular perception that the person has about a situation in the near future. Trait Anxiety often abbreviated as A-trait is a relatively stable disposition that a person has, frequently depicted as a personality trait.
For example, if we are driving and someone nearly hits us — we will become anxiety, we will have an intense anxiety reaction.
This is normal. However, some people will feel anxious more often and inappropriately. For example, someone may nearly hit their car and they become so anxious they have to stop driving for a period of time. As you can imagine, trait anxiety can have a big effect on athletic performance.
Athletes with high-trait anxiety are more likely to focus on the chance of failure. They see situations as more threatening or dangerous, and are more likely to focus on negative possibilities, past failures, mishaps and consequences of failure. On the other hand, athletes with low-trait anxiety are more likely to focus on success.
They respond more effectively to mistakes and stress, and are able to focus on the current situation. Instead of being challenged by their mistakes, they are more likely to be motivated by them to work harder. This allows athletes with low-trait anxiety to recover better physically and emotionally after a mistake, allowing them to get back into the game faster, and focus on a future event. Physiology of Anxiety The bodily reactions to an anxiety stimulus result from the action of the sympathetic nervous system, and from the effects of the hormone epinephrine popularly known as adrenaline ; secreted by the adrenal glands.
This is known as the somatic reaction to stress. The following reactions occur: 1. The rate and depth of breathing increase 2. There is an increase in heart rate and the amount of blood pumped out with each beat. Blood pressure increases. Less blood goes to the internal organs, and more to the muscles. The liver releases extra blood sugar to supply energy.
Production of saliva in the mouth decreases; and supply of mucus in respiratory passages decreases. The pupils of the eyes dilate, letting in more light.
The galvanic skin response or GSR changes in electrical resistance of the skin increases. The GSR is related in a complex way to the functioning of the sweat glands on the skin and through this interaction, sweating may increase. These are similar to the fight or flight responses of stress we mentioned in the previous lesson. The fact that many of these changes are quite easy to measure, provides a basis for the ordinary lie detector, or polygraph. The Cognitive reaction to stress is where the mind prepares for the threat to come.
Psychology of Anxiety Anxiety can be a learned behaviour, and generally is thought of as an internal state usually produced by external stimuli; and not necessarily leading to any particular behaviour. Different levels of anxiety result in many different forms of behaviour.
Anxiety can be used as a motivational emotion when sports participants need to be aware of a threat or danger of loosing a race or game.
Anxiety is a negative emotional state with feelings of worry, nervousness and apprehension that is associated with the arousal and activation of the nervous system. In general, arousal has two kinds of effects on performance.
First, it increases muscle tension and affects co-ordination. Too much tension is detrimental to performance. Second, arousal affects attention. There are several theories as to how arousal affects performance:. Drive Reduction Theory states a linear positive relationship between arousal and performance.
This means that at low levels of arousal, performance is low whereas it increases in line with an increase in arousal. Drive reduction theory became popular during the s and s as a way to explain behavior and motivation. Inverted U hypothesis proposes a relationship between arousal and performance in a symmetrical inverted U.
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