Understanding Stress and Anxiety

Introduction to Stress and Anxiety

• Stress is a perceived imbalance between personal demands and coping abilities
• Cognitive anxiety involves worry
• Somatic anxiety involves physical symptoms, increased heart rate and sweaty palms
• The Stress Model describes stress arising from an perceived inability to cope with environmental demands
• Hans Selye's contributions to understanding stress include realizing effects on:
  • Bleeding ulcers and weakened immune systems
  • Reactions to heat, cold, loud noises, and spinal cord severance
  • Impacts on health and overall well-being
  • Expansion of human conditions
  • Viewing stress as a response to demands
  • Realizing the potential for positive stress management to enhance performance
• Trait anxiety is a part of someone's daily life and personality
• State anxiety is a temporary, situationally-dependent experience

Stress and Anxiety Management

• High arousal can affect muscle tension by affecting performance in antagonistic muscles
• High arousal states leads to narrowed attention, hindering overall performance
• The Inverted-U Theory states that performance increases with arousal/motivation, to a point, and then declines
• The Catastrophe Model states that high cognitive anxiety with increased arousal past an athlete's threshold results in drastic performance decrease
• Multidimensional Anxiety Theory suggests cognitive anxiety has a negative linear relationship with performance
• Somatic anxiety exhibits an inverted U relationship in performance
• The IZOF model posits athletes perform best within a specific zone of arousal and emotion
• Athletes can manage anxiety and arousal, and enhance performance using:
  • Self-talk
  • Cognitive rehearsal
  • Relaxation techniques

Attention and Concentration

• Attention is binary, either focused, or not
• Concentration is a continuum, denoting sustained focus
• Situational awareness and attentional focus enhances athletic performance through ability to understand and respond to the surroundings, make quick decisions and maintain focus
• Internal focus can play a role in distractors like thoughts, fatigue, and boredom
• External focus can play a role in distractors like crowd noise, and official calls
• Associative focuses bodily functions
• Dissociative focuses distraction attentional styles
• Self-talk and quiet eye training can enhance performance
  • Improving focus
  • Reducing anxiety
  • Promoting consistent execution under pressure

Imagery

• Imagery is visualizing realistic images in the mind using the senses
• Commonly used sensory experiences are:
  • Visual
  • Auditory
  • Olfactory
  • Tactile
  • Kinesthetic
• Imagery enhances performance and reduces anxiety via realistic mental images
• Verbal rehearsal aids memory of complex information
• Internal imagery envisions a performance from a first-person perspective
• External imagery involves observing oneself from a third-person view
• Effective imagery training relies on vividness, controllability, enjoyment, engagement, and effectiveness

Self-Efficacy

• Self-efficacy is task-specific; confidence in one'sability to succeed at a particular task
• Self-confidence is a broader belief in one's overall capabilities and worth
• Vicarious experiences impact self-efficacy through observing other's successes
• Past performance is the strongest predictor of self-efficacy
• Technology and mindfulness apps enhance self-efficacy by tracking/reinforcing past successes
• Four predictors of self-efficacy are:
  • Past performance accomplishments
  • Vicarious experience
  • Verbal persuasion
  • Physical and emotional states

Motivation

• Intrinsic motivation is driven by internal rewards like personal growth and enjoyment
• Extrinsic motivation is driven by external rewards like recognition and avoiding punishment
• Self-determination theory defines amotivation through lack of intention and feelings of incompetence
• Task-oriented athletes focus on personal growth, and see outperforming other as motivation through effort and improvement
• Ego-oriented athletes focus on winning and outperforming others
  • Motivation decreases if winning is not likely
• Coaches enhance intrinsic motivation by fostering:
  • Personal improvement
  • Skill development
  • Cooperation
• Avoid social comparison
• Focus on effort and learning over winning
• Risks of relying on extrinsic motivation include frustration, anxiety, and decreased motivation if unsuccessful

Goal Setting

• SMART stands for "Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Bound"
• To-do lists promote focus, accountability, motivation, greater productivity, and progress towards long-term goals
• Goal setting enhances productivity by:
  • Increased output
  • Motivation
  • Determination
  • Connection with better performance
• No goal setting lacks direction and motivation
• Goals are achievable, specific, and measurable, and actively worked towards
• Wishes are desires or hopes
• Goal setting connects to better performance by:
  • Influencing motivation
  • Helping athletes reach their potential
• Subjective goals are broad, vague, less effective, and unclear
• Objective goals are specific, measurable, performance-enhancing, and easily measured