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OP-ED: Personality and success in sports —Humair Hashmi

Self-talk, or whatever one says to one’s self, is a variable that can determine a sportsperson’s performance. ‘Positive’ self-talk facilitates and enhances sports performance, and ‘negative’ self-talk hinders sports performance

Sport psychology developed as a separate field, an area of interest and investigation, in the early years of the twentieth century. After the second world war there was tremendous input by various specialists. As a result, the 1960s and 1970s became known as the boom years of sport psychology. A number of factors were responsible for this boom: one may speculate for instance, that the level of knowledge of psychological principles previously discovered in the laboratories had reached optimum level and could now be applied in real-life situations for the benefit of all. Psychology was beginning to become an applied science.

Also man’s knowledge in general had reached a point where he had been able to develop the nuclear and hydrogen bombs capable of destroying whole cities within the wink of an eye. The need for investment in developing conventional weapons had therefore disappeared. The vast industrial base and the trained manpower that had previously been employed in the development and maintenance of the war industry were becoming redundant. The need to restructure industry arose, putting the advanced technology and human expertise to good use. Hence the so-called developed, industrialised, world witnessed a shift from conventional armament production to production of consumer goods.

This restructuring of industry from war production to consumer goods production, necessitated applying psychological principles in a beneficial manner to areas such as industry, management, consumer behaviour, advertising and sports, among others.

A sport psychologist is a qualified and a trained individual with expertise in applying psychological principles in sports. She has an academic degree of graduation or a post-graduation in psychology, and in addition, has received training leading to a professional certification in any area of specialisation related to sports. Her certification may be in the area of clinical or counselling sport psychology or educational sport psychology etc.

A sport psychologist looks into many areas, but for the time being let us confine ourselves to one broad area requiring her input. The sport psychologist may be interested in the psychological factors that affect the performance of a sports person. Or she may be interested in the influence exercised upon the psychology of a person involved in sports. How, for instance, certain personality-related factors may affect sporting activity and how sport may influence different aspects of the player’s personality.

From the molecular/micro, perspective the sport psychologist may be interested in the relationship between the molecular or personality factors and the performance of a person in sports. However from a molar, or a macro, perspective, the sport psychologist may also look into group, organisational, or extra-organisational factors that may impact the performance of a person in sports.

In addition, as sporting behaviour influences a person’s overall psyche, so does the sporting behaviour of a group or an organisation influence the over-all collective psyche of the people. Cricket fever in the subcontinent and football fever in South America are just two examples of the impact of sports on society at large as well as the collective psyche of the people of a particular region. For the present, however one may confine one’s self to looking at the relationship between molecular factors, or what may be called personality factors in sports.

Consumer purchase behaviour revealed that brand loyalty was one factor that influenced purchase behaviour. This was related to some personality factors, such as gender, extraversion, or sensation-seeking. If personality factors such as introversion or extraversion can influence the consumer’s purchasing behaviour, can those factors also influence one’s performance in sports?

What, in other words, are the factors that might be called personality factors that influence one’s behaviour as a sports person? Looking at some early research findings, it appeared that the initial probe in the area, establishing a relationship between personality factors and sports performance, did not indicate any significant relationship between these two variables.

In the 1980s, however, comparing the personality profiles of international athletes with club-level athletes, researchers saw that there were significant differences between the two profiles. Personality factors like tough mindedness, extraversion and emotional stability, were found to be significantly different among international athletes and others. Research revealed that personality factors do impact one’s performance and achievement in sports, though the relationship was clouded and such factors were not found to be the major ‘cause’ of performance or achievement.

More recent research available up to the late 1990s revealed that certain personality traits may hinder sports performance whereas certain others may facilitate such performance. Conclusive evidence about the nature of the factors is available but the extent of the impact of such factors on sports performance is lacking. With the present interest in research in sport psychology this evidence may be unearthed soon.

In recounting some molecular factors that may impact performance in sports one may point out the level of arousal, anxiety, or stress. Research shows that these three variables are closely related; high level of one is accompanied by high levels of the other two. It was seen that arousal, stress or anxiety facilitate performance but only if these three variables or personality factors remain within ‘optimal level’. And in addition that they negatively influence performance if that level is significantly below or above ‘optimal level’.

Very high or low levels of these factors in one’s personality are shown to be negatively correlated with achievement in sports. It is called the inverted ‘u’ theory and the evidence in its favour was found in a number of experiments in 1982, 1985, 1987, 1988 and recently in 2000.

Research also shows that another personality factor, self-talk, or whatever one says to one’s self, is a variable that can determine a sportsperson’s performance. ‘Positive’ self-talk facilitates and enhances sports performance, and ‘negative’ self-talk hinders sports performance. In 2001 Zinsser and others had conclusively shown for example, that positive self-talk by sports persons helps increase self-efficacy i.e. one’s belief in one’s competence: and that relevant self-talk helps control effort and additionally helps focus attention, leading to an improvement in concentration. This facilitates performance. Some examples of self-talk used by accomplished sports persons, research shows, include ‘I am a consistent and accurate hitter’; or ‘I have a perfect swing’ etc.

The strategy of self-talk has been used by cognitive therapists to treat mental disorders. Their research has shown a remarkable success rate with this approach. Sport psychologists borrowed the technology from them, improving sports performance with equally remarkable success. Self-talk is a factor that a person controls himself, improving performance in sports through control and manipulation of such talk.

Tough mindedness, the level of arousal, positive self-talk and emotional stability are some personality factors influencing performance in sports. Some other factors include FLOW, psychological momentum, imagery, and attentional focus etc. They are more recent and interesting advances in the relationship between performance and personality and warrant separate treatment.

Humair Hashmi is a professionally certified psychotherapist who teaches at Imperial College Lahore

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