Thousands of athletes suffer from sports anxiety forcing them to change the way they perform. Sports anxiety is also well known as competitive anxiety affecting around 30 to 60 percent of athletes. This type of anxiety can cause athletes to have self doubt and lose the love for the sport.
Noticing sports anxiety can be harder for some more than others. There are physical symptoms that could be noticed such as shaking, hyperventilating, muscle tension, and bathroom troubles. These are the physical aspects of sports anxiety and they can go into much detail and possibly harm a person leading to worse problems from sports anxiety. On top of the physical signs there are mental signs. These can involve intense fear of failure, disrupted focus, overthinking, and reduced self-confidence. These negative effects can lead to self-sabotage, lashing out, and poor performance. These are generated from sports anxiety and continue to affect an athlete, worsening their anxiety. These consequences affect athletes in their sport, as well as later in life.
What can actually cause an athlete to have sports anxiety? There are various reasons why athletes have sports anxiety and each athlete could be different. As well, there is the Yerkes-Dodson law that says someone's athletic performance will not be affected by their arousal levels depending on how high and low they are. If someone's arousal is low they’ll most likely find the sport to be boring and not put effort in. Whereas a person who has an optimal arousal is engaged in the sport and pushes themselves too hard a majority of the time. Then there is someone who has high arousal where the athlete is stressed from the sport giving rise to panicing or freezing, leading to them messing up from this anxiety.
Another idea founded in 1990 was the Smith and Smoll model, this ideology states that one feeling of anxiety can feed into another adding more stress and anxiety for the athlete.There are three parts: the mental element, the physical symptoms, and the in the moment impact. The mental element is the most critical because how an athlete thinks sets them up for their future practice or game. The mental element is really when an athlete starts thinking about the future and if they can win or what could happen by losing, causing them to have anxiety before the game has begun. Additionally, there's the physical symptoms, due to athletes becoming anxious from thinking about the match or game, their bodies start reacting and some reaction can be caused like shaking or sweating. The last part is the in the moment impact, at this point the athlete already has so much anxiety that it starts to negatively impact their play. Athletes start worrying about more than just their competitor, but are getting scared about how they’re playing and the consequences of it. This type of anxiety happens to thousands of athletes that vary from different ages and sports.
Sports anxiety is most commonly related to athletes and it can affect them on the field and off. A majority of athletes' identity can be affiliated with their sport, so when they play the sport poorly, it takes their self-confidence and self-esteem away from them, even if they won the game. This type of anxiety can be seen mostly with younger athletes rather than adults in general. A common way to get this anxiety is if it's an athlete's first time on the team or playing in that type of competition. This has been proven to give athletes more anxiety, than someone who has been on the team for a long time or competed in this competition in the past. Furthermore, there have also been studies shown that gender is an aspect in sports anxiety. Studies show it's most common for girls to have sports anxiety. These studies have revealed that anxiety could be increased from an important game, social expectations, helicopter parents, past failures, or solo competition. These are the most common reasons why athletes have sports anxiety, although there can be unique reasons depending on the individual.
Although it seems scary to deal with sports anxiety it's healthier to manage it. There are many ways to handle it, however it will take time and every athlete is different so everyone will have different ways of dealing with it. One way can be positive self-talk, it seems simple, but in reality no athlete does it enough. Every athlete has at least once said something negative and maybe without even realizing it. This could be as simple as just saying “we’re going to lose” or “I sucked today” these words hurt you and your team without even knowing it. Instead say “I’m going to do great” or “we’re going to win this together” and see how different the outcome is. But if you do this you need to believe it because if you don’t, the words don’t mean anything. There was a study that showed 117 junior athletes who had positive self-talk actually had better self-confidence and less sports anxiety.
Other ways to help calm your anxiety down could be something as simple as listening to music. Many studies in the past say that certain types of music help athletes calm down. Also, meditation may help your sports anxiety lower. One way that people use meditation is by finding an object and thinking about that object, nothing else. Meditation has been seen to help athletes more that are in solo sports. Other than helping yourself, there is always the option of getting help. A majority of people get help if they start facing health problems that can include their heart rate or panic attacks, mood changes. However, going to a therapist may help you even if you don’t have these symptoms.
An athlete having anxiety before a sporting event is one of the worst feelings. It can start messing with the athlete physically during play and their mental game. Sports anxiety will affect the way an athlete plays and make them feel poorly about themselves, resulting in them playing in this mood. A majority of athletes are likely to have sports anxiety and the key to helping yourself is by not ignoring it. Instead, find what works for you so that you can feel good and play well as an athlete.
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