Document Type

Honors Project

First Advisor

Dr. Randy Young

Degree Award Date

Spring 2012

Keywords

Self-talk, Performance, Utilization, sports performance

Disciplines

Behavior and Behavior Mechanisms | Psychiatry and Psychology | Sports Sciences

Abstract

The use of self-talk as a priming mechanism is relatively unexplored, particularly in athletics. Participants heard positive, negative, or no self-talk statements from the experimenter prior to performing an eye-hand coordination activity. We hypothesized that being primed with negative self-talk will elicit more self-talk utilization than other types of priming and that participants who practice will be more likely both to earn points and utilize self-talk than those who complete the non-relevant warm-up activity. We found that negative self-talk is the most common type of self-talk utilized in this activity and that priming condition has an impact on the amount of reported self-focused tendencies.

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