BELIEF IN SELF TALK AND DYNAMIC BALANCE PERFORMANCE

INTRODUCTION

Self-talk is something that a person does naturally throughout waking hours. People
are becoming more aware that positive self-talk is a powerful tool for increasing their self-
confidence and curbing negative emotions. In addition, people who can master positive self-
talk are thought to be more confident, motivated and productive. Although positive self-talk
comes naturally to some, most people need to learn how to cultivate positive thoughts and
dispel the negative ones. With practice, it can become more natural to think good thoughts
rather than bad ones. Positive self-talk is supportive and affirming. Rumination is the flip side
of positive self-talk. It happens when the person replays upsetting or cringe-worthy thoughts
or events over and over again in your head. Thinking through a problem can be useful, but if
you spend a lot of time ruminating, small issues tend to snowball. Constant rumination can
make the person more likely to experience depression and anxiety.

Researchers have found that Olympic qualifiers and national team athletes used self-
talk as a motivation strategy [CITATION Jam01 \l 1033 ], to augment skill acquisition [CITATION
Den08 \l 1033 ], for controlling attentional focus [ CITATION Pap041 \l 1033 ], and to enhance
self-confidence (Landin & Hebert, 1999) as cited by [CITATION Placeholder1 \l 1033 ]. The type
of self-talk generated by the user will, to a large extent, determine whether performance is
improved or impaired. [CITATION Dag92 \l 1033 ] as cited by [ CITATION Kao06 \l 1033 ] they
studied the effect of positive, negative, and neutral self-talk on dart throwing performance.
Results indicated that participants in the positive self-talk group outperformed those in the
negative and neutral self-talk groups. In a similar study, [CITATION Raa95 \l 1033 ] found the
same results for individuals who used positive self-talk on a dart-throwing task. Finally,
[CITATION Gou98 \l 1033 ] found that positive self-talk strategies increased performance on a
muscular endurance task. In addition, Despite the growing interest in the area of self-talk, this
topic has been understudied in the sport psychology research. Although, it is evident that
more recently researchers had become interested in exploring its’ relationship to sport and
performance. Self-talk has been described as automatic thoughts, internal dialogue, and self-
statements.
 First and foremost, purpose of this study is to connect the self-talk with two other
constructs, namely, benefits of self-efficacy and dynamic balance performance. When
explaining self-talk and its’ antecedents,[ CITATION Hat08 \l 1033 ] had proposed a social-
environmental dimension, where the role of significant other in shaping athletes’ thoughts is
evident. Therefore, dynamic balance performance has been proposed to influent athlete’s
self-talk. Furthermore, research area that has been receiving increasing attention is non-
performance outcomes of self-talk. Some of those include anxiety, expectations, attentional
control and information processing, but self-efficacy as well. Self-talk beliefs are considered
to be influenced by athletes’ self-talk via verbal persuasion that can include self-statements or
social persuasion from significant others. In the following sections we will describe self-talk,
its antecedents and outcomes, as well describe motivational climate and self-efficacy more in
detail.

Self-talk refers to the verbal dialogue in which athletes interpret their feelings and
perceptions, evaluate themselves, and give themselves instructions or reinforcement
[ CITATION Hac93 \l 1033 ] When we talk about self-talk as content of thoughts, we refer to its’
valence dimension, namely positive and negative self-talk. This is perhaps not surprising
given the absence of an established theoretical grounding for self-talk literature (Hardy,
2006). Given the wide-reaching behavioural, motivational, affectual and cognitive
consequences of self-talk, it is suggested that a greater understanding of the factors that shape
and influence athletes’ self-talk is required. In a conceptual model of self-talk considered,
among other antecedents, the role of the coach in shaping athlete’s self-talk. [ CITATION
Pap04 \l 1033 ] in their study showed that social support provided by coaches, in the form of
esteem support, mediated the relationship between coaches’ supportive behaviour and
athletes’ positive self-talk.

Finally, while not directly examining the relationship between belief in self-talk and
dynamic balance performance, results of the post-experimental manipulation check used
by[ CITATION The00 \l 1033 ] in a series of experiments provided additional support for
investigating the relationship between one’s belief in self-talk and performance. Experiment 2
results indicated that the group 2 told to use instructional self-talk performed better than both
the group instructed to use motivational self-talk and the control group. A post-experimental
manipulation checks revealed that the instructional group believed their self-talk statements
were significantly more helpful than the motivational group

Thus, the group that performed better also believed their self-talk was more helpful. If
self-talk affects performance, then it is pertinent to examine the relationship between the
belief in self-talk and performance. The first purpose of the present study, therefore, was to
examine the relationship between belief in self-talk and performance. Due to the scarcity of
empirical evidence, it was hypothesized that there would be no relationship between belief in
self-talk and performance. A second purpose was to examine the influence of positive and
negative self-talk on performance
 REFERENCES

Dagrou E1, G. L. (1992). [The effects of positive, negative and neutral self-talk on motor
performance]. Canadian1 J Sport Science, 17(2):145-7.

Gould, D. E. (1984). Olympic wrestling excellence: II. Thoughts and affect occurring during
competition. The Sport Psychologist, 6, 383-402.

Hackfort, D. &. (1993). Anxiety. In R. N. Singer, M. Murphey, & L. K. Tennant. Handbook of research
on sport psychology, pp. 328–364.

Hatzigeorgiadis, A. Z. (2008). Investigating the functions of self-talk: The effects of motivational self-
talk on self- efficacy and performance in young tennis players. The Sport Psychologst, 22,
458- 471. .

Hebert, D. L. (1998). The influence of self-talk on the performance of skilled female tennis players.
Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 263-282.

James Hardy, K. G. (2001). A Descriptive Study Of Athlete Self Talk. The Sport Psychologist, 15, 306-
318.

Kaori Araki, J. K. (2006). Belief in Self-Talk and Dynamic Balance Performance . The Online Journal of
Sport Psychology.

Kaori Araki, J. K. (2006). Belief in Self-Talk and Dynamic Balance Performance . Athletic Insight .

Papaioannou, A. B. (2004). Combined effect of goal setting and self-talk in performance of a soccer-
shooting task. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 98, 89-99.

Raalte, J. L., Brewer, B. W., Lewis, B. P., Linder, D. E., Wildman, G., & Kozimor, J. (1995). The effects
of positive and negative self-talk on dart throwing performance. Journal of Sport Behavior,
18, 50-57.

Theodorakis, Y. W. (2000). The effects of motivational versus instructional self-talk on improving