Performance Anxiety

Athletes' precompetitive appraisal determines which emotion they experience with regard to an upcoming competition. Such precompetitive emotions have powerful and potentially destructive consequences for performance. To control and optimise these consequences, it is important to examine precompetitive appraisal. Currently, such efforts are hampered by the lack of a valid measurement tool. The present study aimed to develop a novel measure of precompetitive appraisal. Specifically, the Precompetitive Appraisal Measure (PAM) was constructed by adapting an existing self-report scale. Female and male intercollegiate team sport athletes (N = 384) completed the PAM, along with a measure of intensity and interpretation of precompetitive anxiety symptoms (CSAI-2D) prior to competition. On these responses, (a) a Principal Component Analysis and a Confirmatory Factor Analysis supported the PAM's suggested two-factor structure (Primary and Secondary Appraisal), (b) cluster analyses ind...

This study evaluated the efficacy and long-term effectiveness of intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy (ISTDP) in the treatment of patients with DSM-IV personality disorders (PD). Twenty-seven patients with PD were randomized to treatment with ISTDP or a minimal-contact, delayed-treatment control condition. ISTDP-treated patients improved significantly more than controls on all primary outcome indices, reaching the normal ranges on both the brief symptom inventory (1.51-0.51, p Ͻ 0.001) and inventory of interpersonal problems (1.56 -0.67, p Ͻ 0.001). When control patients were treated, they experienced benefits similar to the initial treatment group. In long-term follow-up, the whole group maintained their gains and had an 83.3% reduction of personality disorder diagnoses. Treatment costs were thrice offset by reductions in medication and disability payments. This preliminary study of ISTDP suggests it is efficacious and cost-effective in the treatment of PD. Limitations of this study and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Extensive research among adults supports the biopsychosocial (BPS) model of challenge and threat, which describes relationships among stress appraisals, physiological stress reactivity, and performance; however, no previous studies have examined these relationships in adolescents. Perceptions of stressors as well as physiological reactivity to stress increase during adolescence, highlighting the importance of understanding the relationships among stress appraisals, physiological reactivity, and performance during this developmental period. In this study, 79 adolescent participants reported on stress appraisals before and after a Trier Social Stress Test in which they performed a speech task. Physiological stress reactivity was defined by changes in cardiac output and total peripheral resistance from a baseline rest period to the speech task, and performance on the speech was coded using an objective rating system. We observed in adolescents only two relationships found in past adult research on the BPS model variables: (1) pre-task stress appraisal predicted post-task stress appraisal and (2) performance predicted post-task stress appraisal. Physiological reactivity during the speech was unrelated to pre-and post-task stress appraisals and to performance. We conclude that the lack of association between post-task stress appraisal and physiological stress reactivity suggests that adolescents might have low self-awareness of physiological emotional arousal. Our findings further suggest that adolescent stress appraisals are based largely on their performance during stressful situations. Developmental implications of this potential lack of awareness of one's physiological and emotional state during adolescence are discussed.

The high statistics of musicians’ performance-related pain and injury are well documented. Research shows that tertiary level musicians’ occupational health education is imperative, and internationally more and more institutions are proactively incorporating innovative preventative educational programmes as part of their coursework. However, there are no courses in musicians’ health offered in any of the music departments of South African universities. In this article we will explore a model towards musicians’ occupational health education, based on the research done by Judy Palac, a specialist in performing arts medicine education. Her collaborative and interdependent model for a musicians’ health intervention has three components: health professionals diagnose and treat musicians with music-related physical or psychological disorders; music teachers provide pedagogy that is founded on sound musical, psychological and biomechanical principles; movement and somatic specialists provide knowledge of the body in music making. Our aim is to demonstrate how this framework is applicable in South Africa. Brief recommendations for possible implementation strategies in the South African context are made.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/18125980.2016.1182823

Objective: To study how people behave under stressful conditions and how Javed Miandad behaved and thought during the famous Sharjah last ball sixer. Method: Besides literature search a survey was conducted with 126 participants from ages 18 to 59 with half of them males and half of them females. Only one survey question was included. The question was " If you were batting instead of Javed Miandad on the last ball and 4 runs were needed and it was the same match the final India vs Pakistan. You were 110 not out and a batsman of that caliber. What would you be feeling? " The study was conducted from September 1st, 2014 to September 30th, 2015 in the San Francisco Bay Area, California including participants from different parts of the world including Pakistan and India. Results: The results came out with 73.8 % people saying they would be confident with a belief that they can hit a six, 31 % said they would be nervous or fearful while the rest had mix feelings. Conclusion: The study concludes that the behavior under the stressful situation when millions of people are watching is independent of the situation but depends on the individual. Some people will react with confidence while other react in a different manner. While Miandad's real behavior, feelings and thought process could not be assessed because the behavior, feelings and thought process varies and depends on person to person.

Περίληψη
Η σχολική θεατρική παράσταση αποτελεί μία κορυφαία στιγμή δημιουργικής έκφρασης επιτελώντας πολλαπλές εκπαιδευτικές λειτουργίες και καλλιτεχνικούς σκοπούς. Ωστόσο, όσοι λαμβάνουν μέρος ως ηθοποιοί έρχονται αντιμέτωποι με πολλές δυσκολίες που πρέπει να ξεπεράσουν προκειμένου να υποστηρίξουν τον ρόλο τους, γεγονός το οποίο αποτελεί πηγή άγχους για τους ίδιους. Ορισμένα άτομα αισθάνονται άβολα στη σκηνή λόγω του άγχους που τους δημιουργείται από την κοινωνική τους έκθεση με αποτέλεσμα να δυσχεραίνεται η παιδαγωγική λειτουργία της παράστασης. Αν και είναι γενικά αποδεκτό ότι το άγχος αυτό μπορεί να λειτουργήσει θετικά, όταν υπάρχει σε τέτοιο βαθμό ώστε να κινητοποιεί το άτομο να λειτουργεί αποτελεσματικά, υποστηρίζεται ότι η έκθεση σε υπερβολικά αγχογόνες καταστάσεις δύναται να επιφέρει αρνητικές συνέπειες. Στο πλαίσιο αυτό η εποπτεία των επιπέδων του άγχους επί σκηνής κρίνεται επιτακτική. Σκοπός της εργασίας είναι η παρουσίαση ενός εργαλείου καταγραφής και αξιολόγησης των επιπέδων του παραστασιακού άγχους προεφήβων μαθητών, όταν οι τελευταίοι λαμβάνουν μέρος σε μία θεατρική παράσταση. Για την επίτευξη του σκοπού αξιοποιήθηκαν δεδομένα παρατήρησης από 792 μαθητές που έπαιζαν ρόλους σε σχολικές θεατρικές παραστάσεις. Σύμφωνα με τα αποτελέσματα της μελέτης δημιουργήθηκε μέσω ψυχομετρικών μεθόδων μία σύντομη, αξιόπιστη και έγκυρη κλείδα παρατήρησης για τον εκπαιδευτικό και μέσω μεθευρετικών τεχνικών υπολογιστικής νοημοσύνης ένας διαγνωστικός μηχανισμός εντοπισμού επικίνδυνων επιπέδων παραστασιακού άγχους, παρέχοντας παράλληλα στοιχεία επιπολασμού για το φαινόμενο του παγώματος επί της σκηνής σε πληθυσμούς προεφήβων.
Abstract
The school theatrical performance promotes creative expression while serving multiple educational functions and artistic purposes. However, those who take part as actors in it face many difficulties that they have to overcome in order to support their role, which is a source of anxiety for them. In fact, some individuals feel uncomfortable on stage due to the stress created by their social exposure. As a result, the pedagogical function of the show becomes difficult. Although it is generally agreed that this kind of anxiety can work positively when it exists to such an extent that it motivates the person to function effectively, it is also accepted that exposure to overly stressful situations can have a negative impact on them. As a result, the monitoring of actors’ stress levels when on stage is considered crucial. The purpose of this paper is to present a tool for recording and evaluating the levels of performance anxiety of pre-adolescent students, while taking part in a theatrical performance. Observation data from 792 actors in school theatrical performances were used to achieve that goal. According to the results, a short, reliable, and valid observation diagnostic mechanism for teachers to detect dangerous levels of performance anxiety, while providing prevalence data for the phenomenon of stage fright, was created, through psychometric methods as well as computational intelligence techniques.

Acute psychological stress affects each of us in our daily
lives and is increasingly a topic of discussion for its role in
mental illness, aging, cognition, and overall health. A better
understanding of how such stress affects the body and
mind could contribute to the development of more effective
clinical interventions and prevention practices. Over
the past 3 decades, the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) has
been widely used to induce acute stress in a laboratory
setting based on the principles of social evaluative threat,
namely, a judged speech-making task. A comparable alternative
task may expand options for examining acute stress
in a controlled laboratory setting. This study uses a withinsubjects
design to examine healthy adult participants’
(n 5 20 men, n 5 20 women) subjective stress and salivary
cortisol responses to the standard TSST (involving public
speaking and math) and the newly created Iowa Singing
Social Stress Test (I-SSST). The I-SSST is similar to the
TSST but with a new twist: public singing. Results indicated
that men and women reported similarly high levels of
subjective stress in response to both tasks. However, men
and women demonstrated different cortisol responses;
men showed a robust response to both tasks, and women
displayed a lesser response. These findings are in line with
previous literature and further underscore the importance
of examining possible sex differences throughout various
phases of research, including design, analysis, and interpretation
of results. Furthermore, this nascent examination
of the I-SSST suggests a possible alternative for inducing
stress in the laboratory

Background: Musical performance is a skilled activity performed under intense pressure, thus is often a profound source of anxiety. In other contexts, anxiety and its concomitant symptoms of sympathetic nervous system arousal have been successfully ameliorated with HRV biofeedback (HRV BF), a technique involving slow breathing which augments autonomic and emotional regulatory capacity. Objective: This randomised-controlled study explored the impact of a single 30-minute session of HRV BF on anxiety in response to a highly stressful music performance.

Introduction: Kenny has proposed that severe music performance anxiety that is unresponsive to usual treatments such as cognitive-behaviour therapy may be one manifestation of unresolved attachment ruptures in early life. Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy specifically targets early relationship trauma. Accordingly, a trial of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy with severely anxious musicians was implemented to assess whether resolution of attachment ruptures resulted in clinically significant relief from music performance anxiety.
Method: Volunteer musicians participating in a nationally funded study were screened for MPA severity. Those meeting the critical cut-off score on the Kenny Music Performance Anxiety Inventory were offered a trial of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy. In this paper, we present the theoretical foundations and rationale for the treatment approach, followed by sections of a verbatim transcript and process analysis of the assessment phase of treatment that comprised a three-hour trial therapy session.
Case: The ‘case’ was a professional orchestral musician (male, aged 55) who had suffered severe music performance anxiety over the course of his entire career, which spanned more than 30 years at the time he presented for treatment following his failure to secure a position at audition.
Results: The participant was able to access the pain, rage and grief associated with unresolved attachment ruptures with both parents that demonstrated the likely nexus between early attachment trauma and severe music performance anxiety.
Discussion: Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy is a potentially cost-effective treatment for severe music performance anxiety.
Conclusion: Further research using designs with higher levels of evidence are required before clinical recommendations can be made for the use of this therapy with this population.

Background: Musical performance is a skilled activity performed under intense pressure, thus is often a profound source of anxiety. In other contexts, anxiety and its concomitant symptoms of sympathetic nervous system arousal have been successfully ameliorated with HRV biofeedback (HRV BF), a technique involving slow breathing which augments autonomic and emotional regulatory capacity. Objective: This randomised-controlled study explored the impact of a single 30-minute session of HRV BF on anxiety in response to a highly stressful music performance.