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Motivation
What motivates people to do sport? It’s very apparent that
some people are keener on it than other, but what is it
makes the difference? Why do people take to some sports
rather than others? Why so some practice seriously while
others are content with just one session a week, or even
less? And what is it that makes people keep on learning or
performing a sport, even when that leads to actual physical
discomfort, or even pain?
People do seem to be highly motivated to become competent at
things. Even we are small babies, we take delight in
mastering physical skills, and this is a distinctive
characteristic in children too. In part, this comes back to
Carl Roger’s idea of the importance of self-actualization in
human psychology. Self-actualization, is a very fundamental
need in people, and it involves making real, or actualizing,
our potential. Learning physical control, and how to express
just what one’s body is capable of is an example of this. So
the Rogerian explanation for sporting motivation would be
that physical development and achieving maximum performance
is deeply satisfying for so many people because it satisfies
their basic need for self-actualization.
Personal and behavioural traits
Other psychologists see the key to sport motivation as
coming form certain personality characteristics, or typical
behaviours. One of these is the need to achieve success.
Achievement can take many form – it might simply mean
reaching a personal best, or managing to perform a complex
activity in a skilled manner, rather than winning a trophy.
But in the 1960s and thereabout, achievement motivation was
seen as being a relatively stable trait, which people could
more or less of.
Atkinston (1964) saw achievement motivation as having two
distinct sides. One side is the motive to achieve success,
while the other is the motivation to avoid failure. These
sides have different characteristics, and different people
tend to have one or the other type of achievement
motivation. They can be distinguished, Atkinston argued,
because those people have very different ways of behaving
and thinking about their sport.
According to this model, people who are mainly motivated to
achieve success tend to look actively for challenges, and be
concerned with developing excellence in their performance.
They try harder and longer to master a difficulty skill, and
value feedback from other people. Typically, too, they are
not afraid of failure, and attribute their performance to
their own efforts. If they fail, for example, they see it as
having been due to poor concentration, or not having
efforts; while if they succeed they attribute their success
to the hard work and effort they put in. Perhaps in
situations where others are evaluating their performance.
Some people, though, seem to be mainly motivated to avoid
failure. They tend to avoid taking on difficult challenges,
but instead choose easier matches or situations. They also
tend to worry a lot about the idea of failing, and they
dislike situations in which other people might evaluate
them, and in which they might fail, because they regard
failure as shameful. Perhaps as a result, such people tend
to perform worse in competition situations or if their
performance us being judged by others. They also - which is
quite a key finding for trainers and coaches – tend to
attribute their performance to externals factors, such as
luck or being prevented by circumstances from practicing at
crucial time.
Atkinson’s model has some drawbacks, but it raised some
interesting issues. For example, the question of attributing
success or failure to internal or external factors is very
important one in sports training. People who make internal
attribution about their success or failure take personal
responsibility for them. As a result, they work harder to
overcome them, and are much more likely to be successful.
People who attribute their success to external factors, on
the other hand, rarely manage to achieve peak performance.
Because they attribute failure to bad luck, or to the
situation, to problems with their equipment, they don’t work
hard as to improve their performance. And as a result, they
don’t manage to achieve their full potential.
Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation
Another approach to understanding motivation is to look at
the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
Intrinsic motivation is motivation that comes from the
person themselves – working to achieve a personal goal of
some kind. Extrinsic motivation is motivation which comes
from outside – working for rewards such as medals, or praise
from other people.
As with internal and external attributions, intrinsic
motivation is an extremely powerful force. Many older people
who take up sporting activities do so purely on the basis of
intrinsic motivation. They want the satisfaction of
developing a personal skill, or of feeling fitter; and they
recognize that they are unlikely to achieve much in the way
of awards or certificates, because of having so late in
theirs careers. Indeed, some sports – notably golf are
almost entirely dependent on the huge numbers of people who
join the sort when they are older, even though the higher
achievers in the field are those began playing it at a very
young age.
Sport provides many opportunities for extrinsic motivation:
there are certificates of achievement, medals, competition
trophies, and any number of other types of reward. These are
important for the structure of the sport, and for providing
the participants with a sense of achievement. But coaches
and sport psychologists recognize that working purely for
extrinsic rewards is not a good thing in the long run – that
some level of intrinsic motivation is also needed if the
individual is to put in the massive amounts of time and
efforts required to put in their personal best. On their
own, extrinsic rewards are not usually enough for people to
keep up sustained effort.
That doesn’t mean, though, that extrinsic rewards are bad.
Their value in sport is that they act as evidence of
achievement – as definite statements that the person
concerned has reached a particular standard, or a particular target. When they act as
‘signposts’ in that way can be extremely useful in helping
the person to strengthen their internal sense of
achievement; and in providing them manageable goals that
they can reach.
Many of the reward systems for beginners operated by
sporting organization works on the principle that providing
novices with certificates of achievement will encourage them
to progress through the difficult early stages, until their
competence reaches a level where they can obtain personal
satisfaction from their performance. They each represent a
set of small, manageable goals which the person can work to
achieve. The amateur swimming
certificates and similar reward systems operated by other
professional sporting associations have been established
deliberated with this in mind.
Sport psychologists working at higher levels in the sports
also use manageable goals – sometimes with extrinsic rewards
but more often without – to structure an individual’s
training and skill acquisition sessions. People work harder
when they believe it is possible to achieve the goal they
for; but if they think that what is expected is too
difficult or too remote, it is hard for them to retain
motivation. So part of the job of a sport psychologists in
that situation will be to work with coaches and others to
establish manageable goals which will motivate athletes or
players, and help them to put in the training and effort
that is needed.
This article is from the
book 'Applied
Psychology' by Dr. Nicky Hayes 2003.
Philip Ang
Asian Golf Centre
Certified & Licensed
USGTF
Master Golf Teaching Professional - USA
Certified Professional Teacher and Trainer - University of
Cambridge UK
Singapore Sport Council - NCAP Level 1, 2 & 3
Singapore WDA-WSQ ACTA Certified Trainer & Assessor
Certified Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP™) Practitioner -
USA
Certified Professional Clubmaker by GCA (USA)
GCA Winner International Clubmaker of the Year - USA
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