Sports Psychology

failure, there are many ways that these psychologists can help athletes to better play their sport. Applied Sports Psychology Sports attract athletes who are in excellent shape, are strongly motivated, and seek achievement. Such physical and psychological qualities only become sharper at higher and higher levels of competition; professional athletes constantly strive to perform at a high level, while finding new ways to get a victory over the competition. The applied psychologists who work with these athletes focus on enhancing competitive output: more goals, more shots, more tackles, more home runs, more laps. Applied sports psychologists work to help athletes hit these benchmarks by identifying individual and team strengths, creating plans for improvement, and measuring the degree of success or failure. An applied sports psychologist working with a team or an individual may employ many different mental exercises, tasks, or coping mechanisms. These tasks do not have to be particularly complex or challenging: Canadian Olympic mission head Mark Tewksbury had the country’s athletes saying a very simple phrase prior to and during the 2012 Summer Olympics: “Why not me?” This type of mantra , known as self-talk , has demonstrated better performance for athletes across many different sports. In psychological terms, the reasoning behind it is quite simple: frequently repeated tasks become ingrained in our minds and bodies. Think about how you feel when you sing “Happy Birthday” to someone—you may feel better just saying the lyrics to the song aloud, because you associate it with positive experiences and happiness. When athletes often tell themselves that they are able and capable, it translates to better performance. Athletes who struggle with a particular aspect of their sport, such as golfers who swing with their arms instead

Chapter 4: How Psychology Helps

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