IMPROVING LEVEL OF MOTIVATION

UNIT-IV

UNIT-IV

IMPROVING LEVEL OF MOTIVATION

4.1 Sports attributions - interest and aptitude

4.2 Developing self confidence

4.3 Attributional training

SPORTS ATTRIBUTIONS

• Attributions are explanations about why particular performance or behaviours have occurred.

• When faced with important, negative, novel or unexpected events, individuals search for

meaningful explanations for the causes of those events. In this regard, it is widely acknowledged that attributions are an area of importance in the field of applied psychology because of their implications for motivation and emotion.

Interest v/s Aptitude

• Interest may be defined as a tendency to choose one activity in preference to another

• Interest by definition is in which what a person likes to do. There is a difference in what you can do and what you want to do

• An aptitude is a special ability in a certain field of performance. It is the result of inherent and environmental factors.

• Aptitude, by definition, is the natural ability of a person to do something like talent

Interest v/s Aptitude...

• Interests are the result of what you do, what you learn, and whom you know.

• These factors change greatly from year to year as your knowledge and experience grows. It is difficult to be interested in something if, for example, you do not understand what it is. A job title such as “marine biologist” or “industrial engineer” does not say much about what that career is like, and so how could someone be truly interested in pursuing either of those careers?

• Aptitudes are the result of inheritance and early development.

• They are not changeable as interests are; research has shown that a person's aptitudes stabilize at around age fourteen, and remain so for the rest of his or her life.

• They have little to do with what you know or learn, and our testing program can provide you with an objective source of information about your natural strengths, thus making educational and career planning more precise and effective.

Interest v/s Aptitude...

• If you have a strong interest in a particular career or occupation, that is something to consider.

• Your aptitude test results might be able to indicate which aspect to explore that would best suit you.

Being a doctor is not the only role in the field of medicine, just as working in a classroom is not the only way of teaching.

Developing self confidence

What is self-confidence?

• Self-confidence is the belief or degree of certainty individuals possess about their ability to be successful in sports (Vealey,1986)

SELF CONFIDENCE

GLOBAL

SITUATION SPECIFIC

Conti.

• Global self-confidence is more of a personality trait or disposition. It is an important personality characteristic that facilitates daily living. It can be instrumental in encouraging a young person to try new things, but it is not that you can succeed at a specific task.

• Situation-specific self-confidence is the belief of a person in his abilities to perform in certain demanding situation.

Sources of Self-confidence

• 1. Performance accomplishments are the strongest contributor to sports confidence. When you perform any skill successfully, you will generate confidence and be willing to attempt something slightly more difficult. Skill learning should be organised into a series of tasks that progress gradually and allow you to master each step before progressing on to the next. Personal success breeds confidence, while repeated personal failure diminishes it.

• 2. Being involved with the success of others can also significantly bolster your confidence, especially if you believe that the performer you are involved with (e.g. a team-mate) closely matches your qualities or abilities. In effect, it evokes the reaction: "if they can do it, I can do it".

Conti.

• 5. Physiological states can reduce feelings of confidence through phenomena such as muscular tension, palpitations and butterflies in the stomach. The bodily sensations associated with competition need to be perceived as being facilitative to performance and this can be achieved through the application of appropriate stress management interventions such as the "five breath technique" and "thought-stopping".

• 6. Emotional states are the final source of self-confidence and relate to how you control the emotions associated with competition, such as excitement and anxiety. Very often, the importance of the occasion creates self-doubt, which is why it is essential to control your thoughts and emotions.

Boost Your Self-confidence

• Exercise 1: Confident situations and situations of doubt• To achieve a greater sense of stability in your confidence, it is

necessary to know exactly what causes it to fluctuate. Divide a clean page into two columns. Label the first column 'High-confidence situations' and the second 'Low-confidence situations'.

• In the first column, list all of the situations or circumstances in your sport in which you feel completely confident. In the second column, list the situations or circumstances that sometimes cause your confidence to diminish. Identifying the situations that make you feel uneasy is the first step towards building greater self-confidence. We will come back to these lists in some of the remaining exercises, but for now, it should have just served to increase your awareness of areas that can be improved.

Conti.

• Exercise 2: The spotlight of excellence• This visualisation exercise recreates the mental state associated with past

performance success and will help you in bridging the gap between your ability and confidence:

• Imagine a huge spotlight beaming down on the floor one metre in front of you. The light beam is about a metre in diameter

• Now think back to a time in your sporting career when you were performing at the very peak of your ability - perhaps using the first column from Exercise 1 to guide you. Each movement you made brought about a successful outcome and everything just seemed to flow without much conscious effort

• In a dissociated state (i.e. looking at yourself from the outside) examine each of your five senses. See yourself inside the circle and excelling. Imagine exactly what the 'you' inside the circle is seeing, hearing, feeling, and smelling. Notice the 'taste of success' in your mouth

• Now step into the spotlight and become fully associated so that you are experiencing events through your own eyes and in real-time. Again, notice what you are seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling and tasting

• Notice exactly what this feels like so that you can reproduce it at will whenever your confidence is waning.

Conti.

Exercise 3: Positive self-talk• Positive self-talk will affirm to you that you possess the skills, abilities,

positive attitudes and beliefs that are the building blocks of success. The statements you choose need to be vivid, should roll off the tongue, and be practiced well in advance of the competition. Most of all, they must be believable. Here are some examples to help you in composing your own:

• Boxer - I have fists of steel• Basketball player (for free throws) - It is just me and the basket• A defensive lineman in American football - No one is going to get through• Hammer thrower - I am the king of the stingers• Judo player - I am as strong as an ox• Striker in soccer - I will slot in every chance• Make your list of four or five positive self-statements and read them to

yourself every night before you go to bed and every morning as you wake up. Through repeated use, they will become embedded in your subconscious and have a profound influence on your sporting performance

Uses of Self Talk

• Building & developing self-efficacy

• Skill acquisition

• Creating & Changing mood

• Controlling effort

• Focusing attention & concentration

Conti.Exercise 4: Exploiting weaknesses in your opponent

Your opponent will harbour doubts and fears that they will try hard to hide from you. Like any human being, they are susceptible to anxiety, fatigue and indecision. If you spend time thinking about your opponents, focus upon which weaknesses and frailties you might most easily exploit. Here are some specific guidelines to help you:

• Study video footage of your opponents and analyse what most often causes things to go wrong for them. It may be that they cannot perform under certain conditions For example, British tennis player Greg Rudeski was known to have a weak backhand that opponents would often seek to exploit

• If you play an individual sport that requires precision skills such as snooker or golf, make a point of congratulating your opponent when they have a lucky stroke but say nothing when they are genuinely skilful

• In team sports, identify players who are easily wound-up and find out what triggers them to see red. Italian defender Marco Materazzi used this technique, albeit in a rather controversial manner, in the final of the 2006 Football World Cup. Materazzi allegedly uttered an insulting personal remark to French captain Zinedine Zidane who reacted badly. Zidane violently head-butted Materazzi and was immediately sent off as a result. Italy went on to win the match

• Some opponents will get highly perturbed by what they perceive to be unfair refereeing decisions. Make a point of being friendly and respectful towards match officials and, in doing so, at a subconscious level at least, they are more likely to adjudicate in your favour in any 50-50 call;

• When your opponent is having a good run of form, use tactics that slow the match down to break their flow.

Conti.

Exercise 5: Using the power of sound• Music has unique properties, among which is its ability

to inspire, motivate and boost one's confidence. There are many tunes with inspirational lyrics or strong extra-musical associations that you can use to increase your confidence before the competition.

• If you want to feel confident and keep your physiological arousal low, select tracks with a slow tempo (i.e. below 110bpm). Conversely, if you want to psych-up, go for a higher tempo (i.e. over 110bpm), and build-up to a tempo of over 150bpm just before competing.

AttiRBUTIOnaltraining

Attributions

• Attributions are inferences that people make about the causes of events and behavior. People make attributions in order to understand their experiences.

• Attributions strongly influence the way people interact with others.

• The attributions you make each and every day has an important influence on your feelings as well as how you think and relate to other people.

Assessing Attributions

Various methods have been employed in the measurement and categorization of attributions.

• Open-ended methods involve the researcher categorizing the oral replies of participants to open-ended questions.

• Derived score methods require the participant to rate reasons for a success or failure on five-point scales for different elements (e.g., ability, effort, task difficulty) related to the attribution dimensions.Problems can arise, however, when researchers try to summarize attributions along dimensions or otherwise assume the dimensional categories of attributions

• Direct Rating Methods :➢ Causal Dimension Scale (CDS), ➢ the Causal Dimension Scale II (CDSII), and➢ the Measure of Controllability,stability, Globality, auniversality Attributions

(CSGU) These methods require the participants to state their reasons for the event and then map those reasons onto items referring to attribution dimensions

ATTRIBUTIONAL THEORY

• Attribution theory is a concept involved in sports psychology that investigates what people attribute their successes and failures to.

• It is a cognitive approach to motivation.

• It assumes that people strive to explain, understand & predict events based upon their cognitive perspective

COPMPETITIVE SITUATION

• A competitive situation is defined as one in which participants expect that their performance will be evaluated by others in some way.

• It is an opportunity to compete with others for some external or internal reward

• There are usually a perceived winner & loser, & an opportunity for participants to explain reasons or causes for outcomes.

COMPETITIVE SITUATION

PERCEIVED SUCCESS(WIN)

Attribution to a stable cause

(ability or task difficulty)

Feeling that future success is expected

Attribution to a unstable cause (effort or luck)

Feeling that future success is not

assured

PERCEIVED FAILURE(LOSS)

Attribution to a stable cause

(ability or task difficulty)

Feeling that future failure is expected

Attribution to a unstable cause (effort or luck)

Feeling that future failure is not

assured

ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING

• Researches with attributional training has revealed that planned interventions can alter ways that an athlete perceives outcome , as well as alter actual performance.( Miserandino (1998), Orbach, Singer & Price (1999)

ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING

• ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING can :

• Positively influence a child’s future expectations & performance

• Determine nature of attributions for outcomes of an athlete using instruments like Casual Dimension Scale (CDS) , CDS II

ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING STRATEGIES

• ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING Strategise result in athletes giving attributions that mirror their training. Classified as :

➢ Functional attribution Strategy : In this athletes are taught to explain the cause of a failure outcome as being controllable & unstable in orientation. Athletes show superior scores using this strategy. Also, athletes exhibited higher expectations for success, more hopeful & more optimistic

➢ Dysfunctional Attribution strategy: In this athletes are taught to explain the cause of a failure outcome as being uncontrollable & Stable

ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING ....

• STEPS FOR ATTRIBUTIONAL TRAINING :

o Record & classify attributions that students & athletes make to successful & unsuccessful outcomes

o For each outcome, discuss with the athlete causes or attributions that might lead to a greater expectancy for success & increased effort

o Provide an attributional training program for athlete who consistently give attributions that lead to negative implications for future outcomes

o For best results, combine planned goal setting with attributional manipulation

• Refer Sports Psychology by Richard H. Cox

THANK YOU