The Sport Psychologist· 1987Q3
Psychological Skills and Exceptional Athletic Performance
- 420citations
- Q3SCImago
- 1987year
Short summary
A 51-item questionnaire revealed that concentration, anxiety management, self-confidence, mental preparation, and motivation differentiate elite athletes from preelite and nonelite collegiate athletes (n=713).
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Key points
- Elite athletes (n=126) reported higher levels of concentration, anxiety management, self-confidence, mental preparation, and motivation compared to preelite (n=141) and nonelite (n=446) collegiate athletes.
- Psychological skill differences were identified using multiple statistical analyses, including regression, factor, and cluster analyses.
- Sport psychologists' ideal athlete profile generally aligned with the observed skill differences among athlete groups.
- Potential confounding factors such as age, gender, and sport type were noted as influencing the results.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
To assess psychological skills relevant to exceptional athletic performance, a 51-item questionnaire was administered to a national sample of 713 male and female athletes from 23 sports. The athlete sample comprised 126 elite competitors, 141 preelite athletes, and 446 nonelite collegiate athletes. Sixteen leading sport psychologists also completed the questionnaire as they thought the ideal athlete might. Omnibus, individual item, discriminant, regression, factor, and cluster analyses all revealed significant differences among the athlete subsamples. The themes of concentration, anxiety management, self-confidence, mental preparation, and motivation were seen to have potential importance in skill-level differentiation, although age-difference confounds as well as gender and sport differences may have been involved. The ideal profile constructed by the sport psychologists generally paralleled the skill differences encountered, although the elite athletes did not report selected amplitudes in the profile.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. The Sport Psychologist, 1987 · DOI ↗
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Field: Developmental and Educational Psychology
Developmental and Educational PsychologyPsychology