Sport and Exercise Psychology

Dr Tony Westbury

Sport and Exercise Psychology

• Sport Psychology – Performance Enhancement

• Exercise Psychology – Public Health

Training and accreditation for psychologists.

• British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences (BASES) – Supervised Experience / Accreditation.

• British Psychological Society (BPS) – GBR / Chartered Status

My Job• Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Psychology • BASES Accredited – sport science support.- Support work since 1991 in curling, cricket, chess,

fencing, gymnastics, golf, hockey, ice and rock climbing, mountain biking, track and field athletics and RUGBY…

- Most of my work for the past 7 years has been in professional Rugby Union. Including an 18 month period as HQ Sport Psychologist with the SRU.

- Specialist interest – injury rehab.

Career Flightpath

• Undergraduate joint honours biology / psychology degree (1984)

• Graduate Diploma in Psychology (1986)• Ph.D in Sport Psychology (registered 1988)• Part-time study whilst working.• First lecturing job – Newcastle Poly. (1991)• Staffordshire University (1992)• Nene College (1993 -1997)• Ph.D completion (1994)

Career Flightpath (longhaul!)

• Sheffield Hallam University (1998-2000)• I moved to SHU on the back of awarding of the

UKSA to the city.

• Napier University 2000 - present • BASES Accreditation 2000• BASES Reaccreditation 2005• BPS Chartered 2008

Observations on my two roles

• Academia;

- Rapidly changing.- Extremely beaurocratic.- Excellence in teaching not as important as

research output and income generation. This has implications for sport science.

- Stable, well-paid and excellent pension. Holidays aren’t as good as most people imagine!

Observations on my two roles

• Sport Psychological Support and Consultancy;- Very challenging in many ways.- Exciting in a way that teaching isn’t.- A young person’s pursuit??- Very unpredictable.- You need to have a self-employed person’s

mindset.

Observations as a BASES supervisor

• Most sport science graduates don’t have enough psychology to be effective sport psychologists.

• Most sport scientists are in a rush to get accredited. I can confidently report that it I did 10 years of support work before I gave more to my clients than I took from them.

• The most important part of the training is counselling. It helps to develop a mature philosophy of practice.

• A fair proportion of aspiring sport psychologists are motivated by a desire to ‘go to the Olympics’.

Opportunities

• Sport Psychology – still limited, much better than Pre1997. Trade-off between security of academia and risk of being self-employed.

• Exercise Psychology – many more opportunities.

A real growth area (excuse the pun!)

Opportunities in many sectors of the economy.