Week 6 Update

This week I focused on my primary research. I started by reading a few articles containing pieces of previously done research.

The website I used the most was; http://www.athleticinsight.com/Vol1Iss2/Cognitive_Behavioral_Anxiety.htm as it contained many pieces of research in enough detail for what I needed, but if I wanted to go into further detail about the research I could. It gave me an idea of how I could research what I wanted to research.

I also used an article I found on Google Scholar, that was a piece of research into the effects on anxiety on a rugby players performance. This was a longer, more specific article that also gave some context into the research they conducted.

After reading the articles/website, I started to plan my own research. I first came up with a few ideas of what I could research into (for example whether performing with an audience affects anxiety levels/interpretation of anxiety.) I wrote my ideas down and then made short notes on how I could conduct research for each of my ideas.

I will decide the actual hypothesis I will go for after I have finished my research, as I will then know what I would like to find out more about.

Week 5: Update

At the end of the week I analysed my survey results. I first analysed them as a whole and then went through and compared the persons responses to my rating scale mainly compared to the level of sport they played (for example college level) and briefly the type of sport they played.

On the whole, the results followed a pattern I expected. It showed that people tend to be more affected by nervousness and anxiety in sport when playing opponents better than them, when playing in competitions and when playing with an audience. However, all but one person said that nerves either optimised their performance or didn't have a noticeable effect.

As well as this, the people that competed at elite and country level, tended to disagree with statements more, showing that playing at a higher level can mean nerves affect you less.

 

 

Also this week, I wanted to further my survey research to try and get more detailed information from people that competed in sport regularly. To do this I created 8 questions that allowed me to get further, qualitative data from people I asked to complete it.

 

 

I gave the questions to 3 people who all played different sports. I will analyse what they said in these questions next week, and will use that information as back-up and applications to my research.