Procedia

Social and
Behavioral
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 00 (2011) 000–000
Sciences
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 30 (2011) 2280 – 2284 www. elsevier. com/locate/procedia

WCPCG-2011

Comparison Relation between Mental Skills with Sport Anxiety

in Sprint and Endurance Runners
Behroz Khodayaria *, Abdulamir Saiiari b, Yaghob Dehghani c
a
Department of physical education and sports science, Darehshahr branch, Islamic Azad University
b
Department of physical education and sports science, Abadan branch Islamic Azad University
c
Shahid Chamran University, Faculty of Physical Education and Sport Sciences

Abstract

The aim of this study was Comparison relation between mental skills with sport anxiety in sprint and endurance runners.
Research method is descriptive. Competition anxiety questionnaire (Martinez ad et all, 1990) and Mental skills criteria (Smith,
1995) was used as measurement Instruments. 72 endurance runners and 72 sprint runners selected as sample for take a part in
this research. After data collection, quantitative data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics and correlation analysis on
SPSS 16.0. Research findings showed that there are significant relationship between mental skills with Somatic state anxiety,
cognitive state anxiety and sport self-confidence (P<0.05). Also there are no significant differences between sprint and
endurance runners in Somatic and cognitive state anxiety (P>0.05).

Keywords: Mental Skills; Anxiety; sprint runners; endurance runners

1. Introduction

Competition has become so important in today’s society that extremely lofty expectations by others are placed
on competing athletes regardless of competitors’ abilities, reasons for participation, and skill levels. These types of
conditions place high stress loads on the individuals who are competing. Anxiety is defined as feelings of
nervousness and tension caused by the environment or surrounding expectation that is related to ‘arousal’. Those
demands are usually so stressful and thus causing an imbalance between the demands and the athlete’s ability to
fulfil the expectation. (Gould, Greenleaf, & Krane, 2002). All these years, increase in performance has been the
basic need or what dreamed by all athletes to stand out in their respective sports. Athletes train hard to improve their
skills and talents regardless of the time they take to do so. According to Coakley (2007), there are many athletes
who are registered under exclusive or elite team dedicate their whole year training and focus to increase their
performance to get scholarship or make it to the professional level thus developing a hope not only among athletes
but to parents and coaches. Unfortunately, high hope also increases the stress on the athletes and it shows a close
relationship with high anxiety.
Dealing with anxiety is an important task for coaches because athletes could not perform when they are under
stress, having problems in their concentration, memory and the priority they should put on in their performance.
Athletes could not perform at their best like they usually could because of anxiety. Consequently, their performance

* Behroz Khodayari. Tel. : +98-916-309-1378

E-mail address: behrooz1620@yahoo. com

1877-0428 © 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license.
Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of the 2nd World Conference on Psychology, Counselling and Guidance.
doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.10.445
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Behroz Khodayari, Khodayari
Abdulamir et al. /Yaghoob
Saiiari, ProcediaDehghani/
- Social and Behavioral
Procedia Sciences
– Social 30 (2011) 2280
and Behavioral – 2284
Sciences 00 (2011) 000–000 2281

is affected during the competition and they seldom achieve victory. (Papanikolaou, Nikolaidis, & Keramidas, 2008).
The stress presented in competition usually elicits competitive anxiety in athletes, providing an additional element
for them to manage. When anxiety is not managed or interpreted correctly, athletes lose control and performance
levels decrease (Hardy & Fazey, 1987; Martens, Burton, & Vealey, 1990). Competitive anxiety is been one of the
most thoroughly examined topics in sport psychology literature.
This is mainly due to the perceived detrimental effects anxiety has on performance, creating the negative view
most individuals hold of this concept. The main theoretical model was used to study the anxiety level that is related
to performance that is Multidimensional Anxiety Theory (MAT; Martens, Burton, Vealey, Bump, & Smith, 1990).
Competitive anxiety is a construct where the symptoms of anxiety are separated into cognitive (worry) and somatic
(physiological tension) components. Anxiety is characterized as apprehension about performance, lack of
concentration, and distraction during competition. On the other hand, somatic anxiety is viewed as perceptions of
abnormal body symptoms such as butterflies, sweating, shakiness, and increased heart rate (Martens et al., 1990).
The Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 (CSAI-2: Martens, Burton, Vealey, Bump, and Smith, 1990) has been
the measure of choice for most researchers of competition anxiety during the past decade.
The CSAI-2 also assesses self-confidence, which is characterised by positive expectations of success. The
CSAI-2 has 27 items with nine items in each of three subscales: Cognitive Anxiety, Somatic Anxiety, and Self-
confidence Athletes and theorists in human performance agree on the influence of psychological factors in the
performance of motor skills, particularly at a high level of competition. As a result, an abundance of research has
been dedicated to finding out not only how to prepare athletes mentally for high-pressure situations, but also what
psychological factors are specifically determinants of performance. The use of self-reporting instruments that
indicate specific psychological skills is widespread, especially in collegiate and professional athletics. Because of
the comparable levels of physical abilities among top-tier athletes, coaches seek to understand which psychological
factors separate the elite from the non-elite (Smith, Schutz, Smoll, & Ptacek, 1995).
Because the interpretation of anxiety symptoms influences performance and elite status in sport, it seems
important to identify the specific psychological skills that may help athletes to interpret their anxiety as normal and
facilitative. Although it is well-established in the sport psychology literature that mental skill training interventions
are effective in enhancing performance and decreasing anxiety (Greenspan & Feltz, 1989; Vealey, 1994; Weinberg
& Comar, 1994), only a few studies had been conducted that examines the effects of mental training on thletes’
anxiety (Hanton & et al 1999 b, Dominikus F & et al 2009, Aufenanger S. J. (2005). Reviewing previous researches
shows that so far none of these researches have focused on studying the relation between sport anxiety and mental
skills criteria of sprint and endurance runner. Thus this study aims to study this relation between mental skill criteria
and sport anxiety of endurance and sprint runners.

2. Method

2. 1. Participants

Total 144 runners (72 sprint and 72 endurance runners) aging 20-28 years old who had participated in track and
field competitions of Iranian clubs were randomly selected. All subjects were asked to answer the questions in a
relaxing environment. They were told that their answers must be based on their competition experiences. Sprint
runners (100, 200, 400)m end endurance runners (3000, 5000, 10000)m.

2. 1. 1. Measurements
The instruments used for this research were questionnaires with three sections in the content. The first was
demographic information, followed by Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 (CSAI-2) (Martens et al., 1990) and
The Athletic Coping Skills Inventory (ACSI-28) (Smith, Schutz, Smoll, & Ptacek, 1995) in order to evaluation of
mental skills. Demographic Information contained details on age and participation level in sport for each
respondent. The CSAI-2 has 27 items with nine items in each of three subscales: Cognitive Anxiety, Somatic
Anxiety, and Self-confidence. The Athletic Coping Skills Inventory (ACSI-28), created in 1988, contains seven
sport specific subscales: coping with adversity (COPE), peaking under pressure (PEAK), goal setting/mental

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preparation (GOAL), concentration (CONC), freedom from worry (FREE), confidence and achievement motivation
(CONF), and ‘coachability’ (COACH) (Smith, Schutz, Smoll, & Ptacek, 1995).

2.1.1.1. Procedure

The questionnaires on CSAI-2 and the ACSI-28 were distributed to runners through their coaches. The
participants were informed of their participant rights during the study and explained all answers and information was
anonymous. Those who agreed to be the respondents had signed an agreement letter for reference. 15 to 20 minutes
were given to the participants to answer the questionnaires in a comfortable environment and they were encouraged
to give their full cooperation as this study is related to their current field of sport involvement. SPSS 16.0 was used
to analyse all the data obtained in the study. Independent T-test was used to differentiate the mean on the anxiety
interpretation and mental skills between speed and endurance runners. Pearson’s correlation coefficient was used to
measure the relationship between mental skills and anxiety interpretation/self-confidence.

3. Results

According to calculated among the variables of the study, it was observed that when mental skins and state
self-confidence increase, cognitive state anxiety and somatic state anxiety decreases. Also, an increase in mental
skills is accompanied by an increase in state self-confidence (shown in table 1).

Table 1. Correlation ratio and coefficient of determination in variables

Variable Mental skills Cognitive Anxiety Somatic Anxiety Self-confidence
Mental skills 1 -0.32 -0.19 0.16
Cognitive Anxiety -0.32 1 0.78 -0.65
Somatic Anxiety -0.19 0.78 1 -0.73

Table 2. Results of t-test in Sprint and Endurance runners

Variable t df P
Sprint
Mental skill 0.32 142 0.75
Endurance
Sprint
Cognitive Anxiety 0.26 142 0.79
Endurance
Sprint
Somatic Anxiety 1. 54 142 0.14
Endurance
Sprint
Self-confidence Endurance 1. 00 142 0.33

As we see in table 2, According to P=0.75 and t=0.32 it can be stated that there is no significant difference
between mental skills of sprint and endurance runners. Also, considering P=0.79 and t=0.26, no significant
difference is shown between cognitive state anxiety of sprint and endurance runners. And with P=0.14 and t=1.54 it
is shown that although there is difference between somatic state anxiety of sprint and endurance runners but that was
no significant. Also, considering P=0.33 and t=1.00, no significant difference is shown between self-confidence of
sprint and endurance runners.

4. Discussion& Conclusion
The results of the study showed that there is a negative relation between mental skill and subscales of cognitive
and somatic anxiety, but there is a significant positive relation between mental skills and self-confidence. According
to the studies by jones and et al (1995), using mental skills and experiencing them during a competition are the best
strategies to control factors which cause poor performance of athletes who can control their stressful conditions
before a competition can be more successful in achieving their goals. On the other hand self-confidence is one of the
most important mental parameters that is influential in the performance of athletes and has a positive linear relation
to performance and can cause athletes to interpret anxiety positively. This finding is supported by past study done by
Aufenanger (2005) where he stated that these mental skills shared a positive relationship with self-confidence
 Behroz
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Procedia Sciences
– Social 30 (2011) 2280
and Behavioral – 2284
Sciences 00 (2011) 000–000 2283

direction. Self-confidence is seen as something that could facilitate performance (Perry & Williams, 1998; Wiggins,
2000, Wiggins, 2001; Weinberg & Gould, 2007; Gualberto & Wiggins, 2008).
Gold and et al (1995) reported that athletes which use mental skills can concentrate better and have higher self-
confidence. Thus, it seems that different mental skills have positive effects on the performance of athletes and
reduce anxiety before a competition. These findings are in accordance with the findings of Fletcher& Hanton
(2001), Aufenanger (2005), Jones & et al (1996) which stated that cognitive and somatic anxiety have negative
linear relationship with performance, and somatic anxiety is inversely related to performance. All sprint and
endurance runners enjoy relatively acceptable skills for desirable performance and can cope with the condition of
the competition. The results also showed that there was no significant difference between sprint and endurance
runners in terms of their level of mental skills. So it can be said that mental skills are an inseparable part of sports
(Orlick & Parlinton 1988, Durand-Bush & 2001).
Results showed that there was no significant difference between the level of cognitive anxiety in sprint and
sprint and endurance runners. They both had the same level of cognitive anxiety and each group interpreted that in
order to perform their best performance (Jones & et al 1996). The level of somatic anxiety in sprint runners was
more than sprint and endurance runners but it was not significantly different. This difference can be due to start
phase of sprints which increases stress and consequently lead to the increase of somatic anxiety. Sprint runners must
have precision and concentration prior to and during competition (Gould& etal1995). High stimulation and
excitement can result in reduction of efficacy. Thus specifically, it was confirmed that mental skills training
programs increased self-confidence (Savoy & Beitel, 1997; Hardy & Callow, 1999), lowered muscle tension (De
Witt, 1980; Ziegler, Klingzing, &Williamson, 1982), and enhanced concentration (Kendall Hrycaiko, Martin, &
Kendall, 1990; Ziegler et al). Thus it can be concluded that in order to reduce somatic anxiety and gaining better
performance, sprint runners need higher levels of mental skills than endurance runners.

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