helping athletes stay focused: attention basics

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HELPING ATHLETES HELPING ATHLETES STAY FOCUSED: STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS ATTENTION BASICS Damon Burton & Bernie Holliday Damon Burton & Bernie Holliday Vandal Sport Psychology Services Vandal Sport Psychology Services University of Idaho University of Idaho

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HELPING ATHLETES STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS. Damon Burton & Bernie Holliday Vandal Sport Psychology Services University of Idaho. What is attention?. WILLIAM JAMES’ DEFINITION OF ATTENTION. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Page 1: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

HELPING ATHLETES HELPING ATHLETES STAY FOCUSED: STAY FOCUSED:

ATTENTION BASICSATTENTION BASICS

Damon Burton & Bernie HollidayDamon Burton & Bernie Holliday

Vandal Sport Psychology ServicesVandal Sport Psychology Services

University of IdahoUniversity of Idaho

Page 2: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What is attention?

Page 3: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

WILLIAM JAMES’ DEFINITION OF

ATTENTION “Everyone knows what attention

is. It is taking possession by the mind, in clear and vivid form, of one out of what seems several simultaneous possible objects or trains of thought. Focalization, concentration of consciousness are the essence. It implies withdrawal from some things in order to deal effectively with others (1890, pp. 403-404)

Page 4: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

SIMPLIFIED DEFINITION OF ATTENTION

Attention is a cognitive process whereby you direct and maintain awareness of stimuli detected by the senses and use that information to make decisions and choose responses. You continually receive information about your

internal and external environment through your senses.

You can not be aware of all the sensory information coming into your senses.

Perception occurs when you attend to sensory information

Decision-making and response selection require attention directed toward key perceptual informant.

Page 5: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What are the two (2) dimensions of

attention?

Page 6: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

DIMENSIONS OF ATTENTION

width of attention (broad or narrow) broad focus would attend to a large number of

stimuli at the same time (e.g., QB reading a defense or point guard executing a 3 on 2 fast break)

narrow focus (e.g., golfer lining up a putt) direction of attention (internal or external)

internal focus is directed inward on thoughts and feelings (e.g., monitor your body’s responses and mental skills).

external focus is directed to events happening in the environment (e.g., evaluating playing conditions)

Page 7: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

Does attention impact sport

success?

Page 8: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

DOES ATTENTION IMPACT SPORT

SUCCESS?

When experiencing Flow, athletes are completely focused on the task at hand, quiet the mind and block out external distracters.

Successful athletes report being able to maintain their focus better, being less distracted, and able to regain focus with minimal effort compared to less successful performers.

Page 9: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

DOES ATTENTION IMPACT SPORT

SUCCESS?

Research confirms that the primary differences between expert and novice athletes is due to differences in sport-specific attention factors. Experts have superior pattern recognition

skills Experts anticipate better because they

can use advanced cues to predict behavior better.

Experts make smart decisions and choose appropriate responses quickly.

Page 10: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What is attentional capacity and how

does it impact performance?

Page 11: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

ATTENTIONAL CAPACITY

You have a limited “attentional capacity.”

Controlled Processing – occurs when athletes consciously focus on performing the sport skill (e.g, focusing on the mechanics of how to execute a tennis serve)

Controlled processing is slow, conscious, deliberate, step-by-step and attention-demanding process.

Page 12: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

ATTENTIONAL CAPACITY

Automatic Processing – when you perform a skill without conscious attention thought.

Automatic processing is fast, holistic, occurs below the conscious level, and is not attention demanding (e.g., can dribble in traffic while looking for an open player to pass to).

Page 13: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

COACHING TIPS ON SKILL AUTOMATICITY

list 3-5 things should do to enhance skill automaticity

list 3-5 things should not do to enhance skill automaticity.

Page 14: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

ATTENTIONAL DEMAND-PROCESSING TRADEOFF

The greater the amount of information to process . . . the greater the attentional

demands (e.g., more choices to choose between, disguise pitches or be more unpredictable) and

the longer the processing time.

Page 15: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What is selective attention?

Page 16: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

SELECTIVE ATTENTION

Selective Attention – is the process of attending to some information coming into our senses and ignoring or screening out other information.

Experts must be able to select the correct cues from countless irrelevant and competing stimuli (e.g., information to focus on when returning serve).

Page 17: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

SELECTIVE ATTENTION GUIDELINES

You attend to cue you find meaningful and interesting.

You attend to things that you have been instructed to attend to or have learned through experience to focus on.

You attend to novel or unexpected stimuli that grab your attention.

Page 18: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What are the “orienting

response” and “habituation

effects?”

Page 19: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

“ORIENTING RESPONSE”

The “orienting response commands your attention under the following conditions . . . The stimulus is very intense (e.g.,

sudden loud noise or bright light) The stimulus is unusual or contrasts

with the background environment. The stimulus moves.

Page 20: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

“HABITUATION EFFECTS”

Habituation – occurs when one becomes accustomed to stimuli that remain unchanged and don’t attend to them.

Implications -- add common distractions to practice so athletes learn to habituate to them.

Page 21: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

DISTRACTIONSDISTRACTIONSInternal External

negative self-talk

doubt

past/future thoughts

physical state

visual auditory gamesmanship crowd opponent’s performance coach mistakes

Page 22: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

How can you better attend to the right

cues in sport?

Page 23: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

SELECTIVE ATTENTION GUIDELINES

develop a mindset,videotape training,performance-related cue words,process-oriented goals,simulations, imagery, and redirect attention.

Page 24: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

1. DEVELOPING A MINDSET

analyze your sport and identify the cues that are critical to top performance.

devise strategies to learn how to focus on these cues, and

minimize the number of cues and keep them as simple and straightforward as possible.

Page 25: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

2. VIDEOTAPE TRAINING

help improve perceptual skills necessary to maximize anticipation,

Batters learn to predict pitch locations and tennis players can anticipate whether passing shots will be cross-court or down-the-line.

enhance knowledge of important cues, and

stop video and ask specific questions about what is going to happen or what strategy to use.

Page 26: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

3. PERFORMANCE-RELATED CUE WORDS

An archer might keep their attention on their shooting by using the key words, “pull, anchor, hold, and release.”

Diver Greg Louganis used the key words, “relax, see the platform, sport the water, spot the water, spot the water, kick out, and spot the water again!”

Larry Bird use the cue words “nothing but net” when he shot free throws.

Page 27: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

4. PROCESS-ORIENTED GOALS

Focus on the present,Don’t focus on the past,Focus on specific process cues,

Don’t focus on outcome.

Page 28: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

5. SIMULATION TRAINING

NASA commonly uses flight simulations to train astronauts to cope with various flight and equipment problems they might encounter.

Prepare to handle . . . poor weather conditions, bad officials’ calls, subpar performance, an opponent’s hot streak, etc

Page 29: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

6. IMAGERY

Using models, videos and photos of performance venues, practice facilities and living quarters at competitive sites, imagery is used to enhance site familarity.

Athletes imagine competing in this environment and effectively coping with potential distractors.

Performers often report a “déjà vu” experience when they compete because their preparation has been so effective.

Page 30: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

7. REDIRECT ATTENTION

Even with the best-laid plans, athletes will inevitably lose focus in some situations.

Champion athletes have a “recovery plan” to put the distraction behind them and regain focus.

Recovery plans use a systematic routine to relax, control self talk, refocus goals and imagine goal attainment.

Page 31: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What is concentration and

what is the concentration

paradox?

Page 32: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

CONCENTRATION: SUSTAINING ATTENTION

Concentration – is the ability to sustain attention on selected stimuli for a period of time.

Concentration can easily be broken by . . . external distractions, our own thoughts and feelings, planned “psych out” strategies, and the intense energy demands of

intense concentration.

Page 33: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

PARADOX OF CONCENTRATION

Because intense concentration is energy demanding, performers often confront tasks with fierce mental effort and try really hard to concentrate.

The harder athletes try to concentrate, the more elusive concentration becomes.

Effective concentration is a passive process that requires effortless effort.

Page 34: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

EFFORTLESS EFFORT: THE CONCENTRATION

SECRET Allow your mind to become absorbed in

the here and now (i.e., the present) Lance Armstrong, Tour de France winner,

reports, “I think about cycling. My mind didn’t wander. I didn’t daydream. I thought about my techniques at various stages.”

Concentration comes naturally when the mind is interested and completely engrossed with the task at hand.

Your body and mind must become totally absorbed in what you’re doing, picking up those cues needed to achieve your goals.

Page 35: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

What are some common

concentration roadblocks?

Page 36: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

CONCENTRATION ROADBLOCKS

Factors that interfere with quieting or “parking” the mind include . . . excessive thinking stress, pain,and fatigue.

Page 37: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

EXCESSIVE THINKING

Coach Phil Jackson believes, “Basketball is a complex dance that requires shifting from one objective to another at lightening speed. To excel, you need to act with a clear mind and be totally focused on what everyone else is doing. The secret is not thinking. That doesn’t mean being stupid; it means quieting the endless jabbering of thoughts so that your body can do instinctively what it’s been trained to do without the mind getting in the way.”

Page 38: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

GALLWEY’S “INNER GAME” APPROACH

Gallwey emphasizes, “Quieting the mind means less thinking, calculating, judging, worrying, fearing, hoping, hoping, trying, regretting, controlling, jittering or distracting. The mind is still when it is in the here and now in perfect oneness with the action and the actor.”

Page 39: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

PROBLEM THOUGHTS Letting go of mistakes is difficult because

we play the mistake over and over in our mind, “beating ourselves up” for the silly error.

We become preoccupied with poor calls or let an opponent’s “trash talking” take us out of our game.

Becoming “future oriented” is problematic because you forget to concentrate on what you’re doing at the moment.

Michael Jordan believes, “You have to block out everybody and everything from your mind. If you let yourself think “what if” as you are doing it, you won’t.”

Page 40: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

LACK OF TRUST Trust – is the ability to release conscious

control over movements and allow yourself to perform automatically without conscious thought.

In important competitions, we want to perform well so we try to control our performance rather than trusting our body to perform the skills the way it was trained to do through thousands of hours of practice.

A pitcher may try to aim the ball rather than throw it or a mountain biker may try to guide his bike through a technical section rather than letting it run naturally.

Page 41: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

UNDERAROUSAL PROBLEMS

Underaroused athletes feel flat and have a broad attentional focus that prompts them to easily lose focus.

Tennis great Rod Laver believes, “Staying interested in a match is a lot harder than many people think. Throughout my career, I’ve always had trouble in the early rounds of a tournament mainly because it was hard fo me to psychologically get up until the quarters or semis. What happened a lot of times is I would fall behind early, maybe even lose the first couple of sets in a five-set match, and then begin to concentrate.”

Page 42: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

STRESS & OVERAROUSAL

PROBLEMS

Overaroused athletes develop “tunnel vision” and begin scanning to search for task-relevant cues.

Scanning makes athletes more susceptible to distraction and more easily panicked.

Overarousal prompts attention to be focused inward. Performers dwell on a constant stream of anxiety-producing thoughts and overanalyze events, prompting careless mistakes and poor decisions.

Page 43: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

How can you improve your

concentration?

Page 44: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

1. learn to manage stress, Effective stress management

allows performers to shift attention from negative thoughts and excessive muscular tension to task relevant stimuli

2. recognize energy demands of concentration, Learn to turn concentration on

and off,

Page 45: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES3. practice concentrating,

Concentration improves with practice, so gradually try to extend the amount of time you concentrate.

Goals promote increased concentration.4. use “performance plans,”

Kayaker, Alan Edge “always had a very detailed race plan with carefully defined process-oriented goals about how he wanted to paddle each section of the course. He attached great significance to having this sort of plan, and used it to help him focus his attention and feel in control.”

Page 46: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

5. implement “recovery plans,” Losing concentration is easy when

something unanticipated occurs. Expecting distractions and having a

plan to deal with them helps regain concentration quickly and effectively

6. “quieting drills,” Rather than emptying our mind, we

should strive to quiet our minds by becoming absorbed in the activity.

Gallwey’s “bounce and hit” drill

Page 47: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

7. experience the skill, Quality practice develops greater

awareness of what feelings and sensations are experienced when executing a movement.

Golf instructors sometimes have students hit balls quickly on the driving range to prevent getting overanalytical and become absorbed in feeling their natural swing.

8. develop external sensory awareness, Gallwey’s awareness drills focus on be

aware of flight, trajectory and spin of the ball in order to hit better shots.

Page 48: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

9. employ “triggers,” Triggers may be words or actions that remind

athletes to concentrate, Archer Darrell Pace turns his concentration on

and off with this trigger, “I look either straight down at the ground in front of me (i.e., off) or at the center of the target (i.e., on).”

10. use “releases,” Releases let go of negative thoughts and

feelings that prevent concentration. “Parking” involves touch their locker when

they go to practice and imagine any outside concerns flowing from their mind to the locker. Concerns must be unparked and dealt with after practice.

Page 49: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

11. direct attention away from distracting thoughts and feelings, Tennis players play with their strings

between points to keep their attention focused externally so they don’t experience anxiety-provoking thoughts.

12. focus on the controllable, Concentration improves when you

decrease your areas of concern (I.e., scoring a goal, winning the game, not letting others down, etc) and increasing your areas of control

Page 50: HELPING ATHLETES  STAY FOCUSED: ATTENTION BASICS

MORE CONCENTRATION IMPROVEMENT

GUIDELINES

13. think nonjudgmentally, The moment start evaluating yourself in

terms of how good or bad you’re performing, you have lost focus and the constant flow of thoughts evaluating, criticizing and instructing begins.

Rather than ignore mistakes, just view your performance with a neutral detachment.

A nonjudgmental attitude requires you to become aware of what you are doing rather than focusing on what you should be doing.