Sports, Exercise and Health Science · C.4 Stress and coping

SEC.4.1 — Arousal and anxiety

Sports, Exercise and Health Science · SL / HL · syllabus-mapped notes

1. SEC.4.1.1

   Arousal

   Arousal refers to the level of physical and psychological activation. This impacts on sport performance in the way that individuals attempt to manage their levels of intensity.

2. SEC.4.1.1.1

   Drive theory and inverted U

   Traditional unidimensional theories of psychological arousal are drive theory and inverted U theory.

3. SEC.4.1.1.2

   The individual zone of optimal functioning

   According to inverted U theory, athletes have their own individual zone of optimal functioning (IZOF). This is the zone where their psychological arousal is personally optimal for their sporting performance.

4. SEC.4.1.2

   Anxiety

   When anxiety is low, individuals experience positive emotions, such as excitement, desire and elation. High levels of anxiety induce negative emotions such as fear, worry and despondency.

5. SEC.4.1.2.1

   Multidimensional approaches

   Multidimensional approaches to anxiety recognize that activation level alone is insufficient to explain anxiety’s effects on performance.

6. SEC.4.1.2.2

   Catastrophe theory

   Catastrophe theory suggests that when both cognitive and somatic anxiety are high, performance declines rapidly or is ended prematurely.

7. SEC.4.1.2.3

   Measuring anxiety

   Anxiety can be measured via subjective measures, e.g. self-reporting, or objective measures, e.g. variation in heart rate and blood pressure and galvanic skin response.