PhD defence: Self-talk and emotions in competitive sports
Julian Fridolin Fritsch
PhD thesis
Self-talk is a popular construct in sport psychology. While one research line called "strategic self-talk" focuses on how the use of predetermined cue words might enhance performance, another research line called "organic self-talk" tries to investigate the natural self-talk athletes have during their sport involvement.
Organic self-talk can further be broken down into spontaneous self-talk (e.g., "What a stupid mistake) as a more uncontrolled type of self-talk and goal-directed self-talk (e.g., "Focus on the next point) as a more controlled type of self-talk. Based on this self-talk perspective, a main purpose of the PhD was to investigate the relationship between self-talk and emotions in competitive sports.
Moreover, with regards to emotions, they involve an internal subjective experience (e.g., a person feels anxious), physiological processes (e.g., increased heart rate), and a behavioral component (e.g., gestures). Because the behavioral component seems particularly suitable for studying emotions during a sport competition, a second focus of this PhD was on outward emotional reactions.
The PhD includes five articles in total. In three review articles, including two narrative reviews and one scoping review, the available evidence in the sport psychological literature regarding this relationship has been outlined. With regards to organic self-talk, these reviews consistently show that, on the one hand, spontaneous self-talk is often an expression of emotions. On the other hand, a main function of goal-directed self-talk is emotion regulation. In addition, concerning strategic self-talk, there is evidence that the deliberate use of cue words can reduce anxiety levels of athletes.
Another article of the PhD includes a study, where the relationship between self-talk and organic self-talk was studied in competitive tennis matches. Here, tennis players were asked to report their emotions and self-talk based on the footage of a previous match. In line with the theoretical suggestions, the findings show that in situations in which players reported only spontaneous self-talk the intensity of emotions is lower compared to situations in which players reported only goal-directed self-talk.
The final article includes a study about outward emotional reactions in competitive table tennis matches. In a purely observational design, it could be revealed that certain situations (e.g., the end of the set) increase the likelihood of table tennis players to show an outward emotional reaction. However, outward emotional reactions did not predict the outcome of the next point.
2021, 231 pages.
Time
2 July 2021, 11:00 (Danish time)
Place
Online.
Opponents
Associate professor Glen Nielsen (chair), Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
Associate Professor Xavier Sanchez, Halmstad University, Sweden.
Associate Professor Maurizio Bertollo, University of Chieti, Italy.
Supervisors
Dr., professor Antonis Hatzigeorgiadas, Department of Physical Education and Sport Science, University of Thessaly, Greece.
Associate professor Jesper Lundbye-Jensen, Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
The thesis is available for inspection at the library, Nørre Allé 51, DK-2200 Copenhagen N.