A penny for your thoughts:athletes’ and trainee sport psychologists’ internal dialogue during consultations

The purpose of this study was to explore the internal dialogue of trainee sport psychologists (TSPs) and athletes immediately following athlete–practitioner consultations. TSPs (four male and three female, age 22–32 years) and athletes (four male, three female, age 19–29 years) completed a thought-listing procedure twice, while watching video recordings of their previous consultations. The thought-listing procedure involved participants’ pausing the video to record the in-session internal dialogue they had experienced during the consultation. Participants’ responses were categorized into six dimensions: time, place, focus, locus, orientation, and mode. TSPs’ and athletes’ retrospective accounts provided evidence that their in-session internal dialogue was (a) present focused, (b) about in-session material, (c) about the athletes or themselves, (d) about internal and external events, (e) professional (i.e., related to the session), and (f) neutral. Findings provide trainees and inexperienced practitioners with insights into the thought content of TSPs and athletes to guide their own athlete interactions

Thinking Aloud: Stress and coping in junior cricket batsman during challenge and threat states

The present study examined stress and coping of cricket batsmen during challenge and threat states using the Think-Aloud method. Ten male elite-level junior cricket batsmen took part in the study. A repeated measures design was implemented, with participants verbalizing while both in (a) a threat state and (b) a challenge state. Participants were required to score 36 runs in 30 balls during the threat condition and 15 runs in 30 balls during the challenge condition. Verbalizations were subsequently transcribed verbatim and analyzed for stressors, coping strategies, and any other reoccurring themes. A paired-samples t-test was conducted to examine differences in the number of verbalizations made for each theme between conditions. Ten secondary themes were grouped into four primary themes; these included (a) stressors, (b) problem-focused coping, (c) emotion-focused coping, and (d) gathering information. There were significant differences( p≤0.05) between stressor verbalizations, with significantly more verbalizations made by participants during a threat state. No significant differences were found between any other themes. Thus, during a threat state, participants reported significantly more stressor verbalizations compared to a challenge state, while there were no significant differences in coping strategies reported (p>0.05). This finding offers a potential explanation for why athletic performance diminishes when in a threat state, as athletes then experience a greater number of stressors but do not report engaging in more coping strategies

Quantifying uncertainties due to optical potentials in one-neutron knockout reactions

One-neutron knockout reactions have been widely used to extract information about the single-particle structure of nuclei from the valley of stability to the driplines. The interpretation of knockout data relies on reaction models, where the uncertainties are typically not accounted for. In this work we quantify uncertainties of optical potentials used in these reaction models and propagate them, for the first time, to knockout observables using a Bayesian analysis. We study two reactions in the present paper, the first of which involves a loosely-bound halo projectile, $^{11}$Be, and the second a tightly-bound projectile, $^{12}$C. We first quantify the parametric uncertainties associated with phenomenological optical potentials. Complementing to this approach, we also quantify the model uncertainties associated with the chiral forces that can be used to construct microscopic optical potentials. For the phenomenological study, we investigate the impact of the imaginary terms of the optical potential on the breakup and stripping components of the knockout cross sections as well as the impact of the angular range. For the $^{11}$Be case, the theoretical uncertainty from the phenomenological method is on the order of the experiment uncertainty on the knockout observables; however, for the $^{12}$C case, the theoretical uncertainty is significantly larger. The widths of the confidence intervals for the knockout observables obtained for the microscopic study and the phenomenological approach are of similar order of magnitude. Based on this work we conclude that structure information inferred from the ratio of the knockout cross sections, will carry a theoretical uncertainty of at least $20\%$ for halo nuclei and at least $40\%$ for tightly-bound nuclei.Comment: 12 pages (including 2 of supplemental material and 1 of reference), 5 figures, 2 table

Preparation, structured deliberate practice and decision making in elite level football: The case study of Gary Neville (Manchester United FC and England)

Decision making in elite level sporting competition is often regarded as distinguishing success from failure. As an intricate brain-based process it is unlike other physical processes because it is invisible and is typically only evidenced after the event. This case study shows how an individual achieved great success in elite level professional football through consistent positive decision making on and off the field of play. Through prolonged interviewing, Gary Neville, a player from Manchester United Football Club, explored personal behaviours, the structure and activities of deliberate practice and his professional choices in match preparation. His career-long devotion to purposeful organised practice was focused on cognition, physical preparation, context-relative physical action and refined repetition to optimise his mental comfort while enhancing his match day performances. This approach was underpinned by diligent personal and collective organisation and by concerted action. Results provide an insight into the categorical nature of his deliberate practice, sport-specific information processing and match-based decision making. At the operational level, his process was mediated by a complex mental representation of ongoing and anticipated game situations; these representations were continuously updated during each match. Allowing for the limitations of the design, implications are provided for developmental and educational coaching, match preparation, deliberate practice activity and improved use of the performance analysis software packages in professional football

Equilibration and circulation of Red Sea Outflow water in the western Gulf of Aden

Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2005. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Physical Oceanography 35 (2005): 1963–1985, doi:10.1175/JPO2787.1.Hydrographic, direct velocity, and subsurface float observations from the 2001 Red Sea Outflow Experiment (REDSOX) are analyzed to investigate the gravitational and dynamical adjustment of the Red Sea Outflow Water (RSOW) where it is injected into the open ocean in the western Gulf of Aden. During the winter REDSOX cruise, when outflow transport was large, several intermediate-depth salinity maxima (product waters) were formed from various bathymetrically confined branches of the outflow plume, ranging in depth from 400 to 800 m and in potential density from 27.0 to 27.5 σθ, a result of different mixing intensity along each branch. The outflow product waters were not dense enough to sink to the seafloor during either the summer or winter REDSOX cruises, but analysis of previous hydrographic and mooring data and results from a one-dimensional plume model suggest that they may be so during wintertime surges of strong outflow currents, or about 20% of the time during winter. Once vertically equilibrated in the Gulf of Aden, the shallowest RSOW was strongly influenced by mesoscale eddies that swept it farther into the gulf. The deeper RSOW was initially more confined by the walls of the Tadjura Rift, but eventually it escaped from the rift and was advected mainly southward along the continental slope. There was no evidence of a continuous boundary undercurrent of RSOW similar to the Mediterranean Undercurrent in the Gulf of Cadiz. This is explained by considering 1) the variability in outflow transport and 2) several different criteria for separation of a jet at a sharp corner, which indicate that the outflow currents should separate from the boundary where they are injected into the gulf.This work was supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation under Grants OCE-9818464 (WHOI) and OCE-9819506 (RSMAS)

Qualitative perspectives on how Manchester United Football Club developed and sustained serial winning

Talent development in sport is well represented in scientific literature. Yet, the drive to protect ‘trade secrets’ often means that access to these high performing groups is rare, especially as these high level performances are being delivered. This leaves the details of high-end working practices absent from current academic commentary. As a result, clubs interested in developing excellent practice are left to build on personal initiative and insight and/or custom-and-practice, which is unlikely to yield successful outcomes. To address this shortfall the current study reports on prolonged engagement with a single high performing club, considering how their practice corresponds with existing sport talent development models. The paper ends by proposing an evidence-based, football-specific model for talent development, maintained high level performance and serial winning. This model emphasises four dominant features: culture, behavioral characteristics, practice engagement and the managing and guiding of performance ‘potential’. The study provides insights into the visceral reality of daily experiences across the life course of professional soccer, while advancing the evidence-base for understanding how Manchester United achieved their serial success

Global synthesis of conservation studies reveals the importance of small habitat patches for biodiversity

Island biogeography theory posits that species richness increases with island size and decreases with isolation. This logic underpins much conservation policy and regulation, with preference given to conserving large, highly connected areas, and relative ambivalence shown toward protecting small, isolated habitat patches. We undertook a global synthesis of the relationship between the conservation value of habitat patches and their size and isolation, based on 31 systematic conservation planning studies across four continents. We found that small, isolated patches are inordinately important for biodiversity conservation. Our results provide a powerful argument for redressing the neglect of small, isolated habitat patches, for urgently prioritizing their restoration, and for avoiding simplistic application of island biogeography theory in conservation decisions.Peer reviewe