In this series we publish blog posts written by our first year undergraduate students for the PB101 Foundations of Psychological Science course. In this post, LSE General Course student Kellen Kruglewicz explores how the rise of sports psychology among professional athletes has impacted modern sports performance. 

Have you recently seen or heard about professional athletes’ mental games on national broadcasts? Have you been intrigued by the seemingly rigorous mental training programs many partake in? The rise of sports psychology within the mainstream media has made it more socially acceptable for professional athletes to speak about their mental game as well as their physical game. This has led many athletes to hire their own personal sports psychologists to unlock the relatively untapped mental side of uber-competitive professional sports.

What is sports psychology and how has it risen in popularity?

Sports psychology aims to understand the behaviours and mental processes of athletes and apply traditional psychological frameworks to help athletes master their mental game and gain a competitive advantage (15). Studies have found that sports psychology has been proven to reduce anxiety and increase the movements critical to success in sports (7) and mental readiness is even regarded as the most significant link with Olympic rankings (1). Its recent rise in popularity has resulted in acceptance and adoption from athletes across a wide range of sports, creating more mentally sound and therefore talented athletes across the globe.

Even the best of the best use sports psychologists! For fans of basketball, both Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant credit sports psychologist George Munford as an integral part of their success. In addition to maintaining peak physical shape, George helped them better control their brain and reach a new level of performance on the court (16).

Psychological elements of sports

There are many psychological elements of sports with some of the most important and researched being resilience, emotional regulation, concentration, and mental toughness (1). Addressing these psychological elements with a professional lens is crucial for optimizing athletic performance. Technology has played a tremendous role in the evolution of these psychological elements. There are several exciting new technologies that are looking to continue the exponential curve of sports psychology and allow sports psychologists to better understand the action and mental coaching in sports such as virtual reality, eye tracking, and brain stimulation (14). As more and more professional athletes see the benefits of sports psychology and decide to embark on a journey of mental fitness, innovation will continue and bring sports psychology to new heights.

What is the science behind its effectiveness & what are the true impacts of sports psychology on the brain?

Perception and the brain

Sports psychology impacts many aspects of an athlete, the most prevalent being their brain. Sports psychologists focus specifically on improving and mastering a few specific areas of the brain with the top three being the motor cortex, the prefrontal cortex, and the amygdala (9).

Image from braintumoursurgery.co.uk.

The motor cortex’s main application to sports performance is improving motor skills and coordination. Transcranial magnetic stimulation is one of the most proven techniques psychologists use to help athletes (8). TMS uses magnetic fields to put a short electrical current through an athlete’s brain and has been shown to improve motor skills and reduce muscle fatigue (12). The prefrontal cortex handles decision-making and impulse control, two of the most important tasks for an athlete to keep calm and collected in the heat of a competitive match. Observation and imagery have been proven to build up the ability to better control the prefrontal cortex, leading to more sound decision-making and less emotional lashes that have been proven to be detrimental to the outcome of a competition (10). Emotional stability is paramount to professional athletic success. Because of this, many sports psychologists have put major focus into helping athletes manage their amygdala and resulting emotions such as fear and anxiety (2). Emotional regulation is something Daria Abramowicz works profusely on with professional tennis phenom Iga Swiatek (13). Her work even led the 20-year-old to her first grand slam, something she credits to her newfound mental health and preparedness.

Cognitive processes

Now that you are familiar with what areas of the brain sports psychologists use to train their athletes, we can dive into the cognitive processes that are crucial to maximizing performance. Attention and memory are two of the most crucial areas that are worked on. Drills such as simulation training, goal setting, pre-performance routines, and trigger words are used to improve concentration which in turn increases performance (11). While memory may not be thought of as a top skill for professional athletes, it is very important for attention control. Working memory is the middle step within the brain’s memory process. It is more commonly known as short-term memory and is the most valuable part of the memory chain in sports because it is essential for an athlete to avoid distractions (5).

Several other cognitive processes are used to best train athletes such as resilience building and self-talk. Resilience building moulds the ability of an athlete to respond positively to setbacks and has been proven to be enhanced through rational emotive behaviour therapy (6). REBT aims to help athletes challenge unhelpful thoughts and avoid negative emotions (3). Have you ever seen a professional athlete mumbling to themselves? Well, chances are that you have witnessed an athlete engaging in positive self-talk. Self-talk is a method of using positive reinforcement language to improve performance, mood, and confidence (4). Novak Djokovic is very famous for his self-talk on the court, facilitating an ability to stay calm and positive throughout a tennis match that has helped him win 24 grand slams and counting.

What does the future hold for sports psychology?

The rise in popularity of sports psychologists has led and will continue to lead to the unlocking of greater and greater sports performance, so sit back, relax, and watch as your favourite athletes continue to smash world records in large part due to the amazing psychologists behind the scenes.

• This post was originally written as part of PB101: Foundations of Psychological Science, which is a core course on the BSc Psychological and Behavioural Science. It has been published with the permission of the author.
• The opinions in this post are of the author, not of the Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science or LSE.
• Cover image by Tim Gouw from Pexels.

References

1. Bali, A. (2015). Psychological factors affecting sports performance. International Journal of Physical Education, Sports and Health. https://www.kheljournal.com/archives/2015/vol1issue6/PartB/1-5-77.pdf
2. Castro-Sánchez, M., Zurita-Ortega, F., Chacón-Cuberos, R., López-Gutiérrez, C. J., & Zafra-Santos, E. (2018, May 1). Emotional intelligence, motivational climate and levels of anxiety in athletes from different categories of sports: Analysis through structural equations. MDPI. https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/5/894
3. Deen, S., Turner, M. J., & Wong, R. S. K. (2017, September 1). The effects of REBT, and the use of credos, on irrational beliefs and resilience qualities in athletes. Human Kinetics. https://doi.org/10.1123/tsp.2016-0057
4. Funatsu, Y. (2018). Usage of self-talk in competition by athletes. Global Journal of Human Social Science: A Arts & Humanities – Psychology. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Usage-of-Self-Talk-in-Competition-by-Athletes-By-Funatsu/846be620ebd513dea8ee3dc16f6a0a10615e0028
5. Furley, P., & Wood, G. (2016). Working memory, attentional control, and expertise in sports: A review of current literature and directions for future research. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition. https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1016/j.jarmac.2016.05.001
6. Galli, N., & Gonzalez, S. (2015). Psychological resilience in sport: A review of the literature and implications for research and practice. International Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1612197X.2014.946947
7. Gustafsson, H., Lundqvist, C., & Tod, D. (2017). Cognitive behavioral intervention in sport psychology: A case illustration of the exposure method with an elite athlete. Journal of Sport Psychology in Action. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21520704.2016.1235649
8. Holmes, P., & Wright, D. (2017, March 22). Motor Cognition and Neuroscience in sport psychology. Current Opinion in Psychology. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352250X16301646?via%3Dihub
9. Lewthwaite, R., & Wulf, G. (2017, April 13). Optimizing motivation and attention for motor performance and learning. Current Opinion in Psychology. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352250X1630152X?via%3Dihub
10. Loporto, M., McAllister, C., Williams, J., Hardwick, R., & Holmes, P. (2011). Investigating central mechanisms underlying the effects of action observation and imagery through transcranial magnetic stimulation. Journal of Motor Behavior. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00222895.2011.604655
11. Moran, A. (2017, February 15). Attention and concentration training in sport. Reference Module in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Psychology. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/B9780128093245054766?via%3Dihub
12. Moscatelli, F., Messina, A., Valenzano, A., Monda, V., Salerno, M., Sessa, F., La Torre, E., Tafuri, D., Scarinci, A., Perrella, M., Marsala, G., Monda, M., Cibelli, G., Porro, C., & Messina, G. (2021, March 28). Transcranial magnetic stimulation as a tool to investigate motor cortex excitability in Sport. MDPI. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci11040432
13. Ozmo, S. (2022, March 26). Interview with Daria Abramowicz, Iga Swiatek’s sports psychologist. Tennis Majors. https://www.tennismajors.com/roland-garros-news/iga-swiatek-know-herself-better-interview-with-daria-abramowicz-sports-psychologist-roland-garros-415853.html
14. Schack, T., Hagan, J., & Essig, K. (2020). Coaching with virtual reality, intelligent glasses and neurofeedback: the potential impact of new technologies. International Journal Sports Psychology. http://dx.doi.org/10.7352/IJSP.2020.51.667
15. Singh, V., Rajpurohit, R., Das, R., Bhutia, T., & Bisht, P. (2023, June). Sports psychology: Exploring the origins, development, and increasing demands in sports and exercise sciences. The International Journal of Indian Psychology. https://ijip.in/articles/sports-psychology-exploring-the-origins-development-and-increasing-demands-in-sports-and-exercise-sciences/
16. Starjacki, W. (2020, April 1). Sports psychologist that worked with Kobe Bryant: “he had a commitment to excellence and deliberate practice” . Basketball Network. https://www.basketballnetwork.net/off-the-court/sports-psychologist-that-worked-with-kobe-bryant-he-had-a-commitment-to-excellence-and-deliberate-practice