Evaluate the contribution made by Eysenck to our understanding ofanxiety in sport

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Evaluate the contribution made by Eysenck to our understanding of anxiety in sport

The relationship between anxiety and performance is imperative as when feelings of anxiety are experienced in a sporting situation, the subsequent effects can be huge. Attempts to understand the effects of anxiety upon performance in sport have been ongoing for many years, and several theories and explanations have been developed to try and improve our understanding of the relationship between stress, anxiety and performance in sport. Eysenck has developed several theories regarding anxiety, and his contribution will be discussed and evaluated.  

In order to understand anxiety within the context of sport and the implications it may have, an understanding of the earlier theories of anxiety is essential. In his studies, H.J. Eysenck (1967, in Eysenck 1992) approached anxiety from a physiological perspective. He claimed that genetic factors account for 50-60 percent of individual differences in the personality element of trait anxiety. However, there were many problems with the physiological approach and although genetic factors can influence trait anxiety to an extent, (Eysenck (2000) claimed that genetic factors can only account for approximately 35 per cent of individual differences in trait anxiety) it does not account for environmental influences and individual differences in cognitive functioning. As trait anxiety has been found to have a genetic element, albeit not a great one; it is therefore useful for sports performers that have a predisposition of trait anxiety to implement stress management strategies before performances, in order to control their state anxiety levels.

Owing to problems with the physiological approach to anxiety, M. Eysenck began to focus on a cognitive approach to anxiety. The cognitive approach to anxiety considered how individual’s process threatening information. The cognitive theory of anxiety proposed by Eysenck (1992) demonstrated how individual differences in trait anxiety depend partly on cognitive biases and this notion is supported by various studies, (Macleod & Matthews, 1988; Breck & Smith, 1983; Macleod & Cohen, 1993, in Eysenck, 1992). He suggested that individuals who experience high levels of trait anxiety possess three cognitive biases; selective attention bias, interpretive bias and negative memory bias. Using this as a basis, Eysenck then went on to develop his four-factor theory of anxiety.

Eysenck (1997) developed his four-factor theory of anxiety in part through a synthesis of the theories of Williams (1988) and Weinberger, Schwartz & Davidson (1979). Using the four personality types proposed by Weinberger et al (1979); i.e. hi-anxious, low-anxious, repressors, and defensive hi-anxious, Eysenck attempted to explain how the characteristics and biases of these different personality types can influence the level of experienced anxiety. Briefly, what this theory suggests is as a result of cognitive biases individuals have variations in their levels of trait anxiety, and in the emphasis which they place on social desirability. From this; Eysenck’s theory assumes that high-anxious individuals have biases which cause them to be more conscious of threatening situations and also to interpret ambiguous situations as threatening. This is in contrast to repressors, who underrate threatening situations and tend to view ambiguous situations as unthreatening.

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In their research, Kelly, Smith & Holmes (in press) focused on Eysenck's four factor theory of anxiety and the role cognitive biases play in the experience of anxiety of sports performers, in particular repressors. Using golf, Kelly et al aimed to establish whether a characteristic of repressors in sport is that they tend to interpret anxiety symptoms as facilitating, and also whether hi-anxious, low-anxious and repressors differed in their expectations of future performances. What they found was that repressors did not interpret anxiety as more facilitative than hi or low anxious individuals; however they tend did to be overly ...

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