Psychological Factors and Sport Injuries: What Can a Sport and Performance Professional Do? Part 1
When looking at the topic of injuries and injury prevention and rehabilitation, much must be attended to to provide the best care to an athlete. Sport injury risk is multifactorial, and any prevention program must account for this nature (Gledhill et al., 2018).
Designing a Rehabilitation Program: Things to Think About
There are many different factors associated with injury and the rehabilitation process. It is not a linear and straight forward journey. Many of us could agree that we wish it was! Referral, adherence, and modeling are essential concepts to consider in the process when building a rehabilitation training program. However, there are other considerations that need to be included to support adherence, for example.
Introducing Self-Compassion Within a Team
It is no secret that I believe in the power of self-compassion with it comes to sport and performance psychology. Many times the question that is asked is if self-compassion hampers the competitive edge. The answer is no. Self-compassion does not mean that you can't push yourself and acknowledge your mistakes. Rather, it means that you do not tear yourself down when you are pushing yourself. It is counterproductive to tear yourself down when you need to build self-efficacy and self-confidence.
Injury Prevention Using Stress Management, Goal Setting, and Self-Confidence
Stress management, goal setting, and self-confidence all have a role in helping to reduce injuries. Though it needs to be kept in mind that sport injury risk is multifactorial, and that any injury prevention program needs to account for this nature (Gledhill et al., 2018).
Imagery for Rehabilitation From a Severe Injury
Using imagery during rehabilitation for an athlete with a severe injury can be helpful if executed well, adequately utilized by the athlete, and as many variables that can be accounted for are taken into account.
Expertise and Deliberate Practice
Deliberate practice (DP) is a fairly popular topic when it comes to discussing expertise in sports and other professions. So what is DP?
Ericsson (2008) originally constructed the definition of DP to have the following components:
Individual active engagement
Training crafted by a coach, teacher, or similar
Dedicated to the improvement of a particular action
Integration of immediate feedback
Space for problem-solving and evaluation
Repetition of the action to cultivate the action
Definition of Expertise with Age
Expertise in sports is a complex process and, when talked about, can elicit many different thoughts, comments, and feelings. So what happens when we bring age into the picture? What happens to the definition of expertise? What happens when we consider physiological constraints, psychological processes, and the experience of aging?
Self-Modeling in Sports
What is self-modeling? I am sure that you could guess the answer to this question if you do not already know the answer. Self-modeling is a technique that encourages athlete development of new and current skills to improve performance by observing themselves in action. This type of technique is grounded in social cognitive theory, which aims to explain how people learn and develop different behaviors via interactions with other people and their environment, emphasizing interactions between personal factors, environmental influences, and behavior.
Who Likes to Practice? Does a Coach Influence Liking Practice?
Why do so many athletes hate to practice?
What a question to ask. Talk about a loaded question to ask. There could be many answers to this question, and it can bring up many different thoughts and feelings. This post aims to offer some thoughts, but at the end of the day it is up to each individual athlete to answer this question for themselves. With that said, let’s dive in and see what we can explore.
Expertise, Mental Practice and Nature or Nurture
Hebb (1949) wrote that expertise “is a product of 100% nature and 100% nurture.” Interesting statement to make and fun to think about. What about the nature versus nurture argument can we use to learn about sport expertise?