Priming as a means of preventing skill failure under pressure

Copyright @ 2010 Human KineticsThe present study examined the effectiveness of a priming paradigm in alleviating skill failure under stress. The priming intervention took the form of a scrambled sentence task. Experiment 1: Thirty-four skilled field-hockey players performed a dribbling task in low-and high-pressure situations under single task, skill-focused, and priming conditions. Results revealed a significant increase in performance time from low to high pressure. In addition, performance in the priming condition was significantly better than in the control and skill-focused conditions. Experiment 2: Thirty skilled field-hockey players completed the same dribbling task as in Experiment 1; however, in addition to the control and skill-focused conditions, participants were allocated to either a positive, neutral, or negative priming condition. Results revealed significant improvements in performance time from the skill focus to the control to the priming condition for the positive and neutral groups. For the negative group, times were significantly slower in the priming condition. Results are discussed in terms of utilizing priming in a sporting context

Counting racks of order n

A rack on $[n]$ can be thought of as a set of maps $(f_x)_{x \in [n]}$, where each $f_x$ is a permutation of $[n]$ such that $f_{(x)f_y} = f_y^{-1}f_xf_y$ for all $x$ and $y$. In 2013, Blackburn showed that the number of isomorphism classes of racks on $[n]$ is at least $2^{(1/4 - o(1))n^2}$ and at most $2^{(c + o(1))n^2}$, where $c \approx 1.557$; in this paper we improve the upper bound to $2^{(1/4 + o(1))n^2}$, matching the lower bound. The proof involves considering racks as loopless, edge-coloured directed multigraphs on $[n]$, where we have an edge of colour $y$ between $x$ and $z$ if and only if $(x)f_y = z$, and applying various combinatorial tools.Comment: Minor edits. 21 pages; 1 figur

Priming to promote fluent motor skill execution: Exploring attentional demands

The effect of priming on the speed and accuracy of skilled performance and on a probe-reaction time task designed to measure residual attentional capacity, was assessed. Twenty-four skilled soccer players completed a dribbling task under three prime conditions (fluency, skill-focus, and neutral) and a control condition. Results revealed changes in trial completion time and secondary task performance in line with successfully priming autonomous and skill-focused attention. Retention test data for task completion time and probe-reaction time indicated a linear decrease in the priming effect such that the effect was nonsignificant after 30 min. Results provide further support for the efficacy of priming and provide the first evidence of concurrent changes in attentional demands, consistent with promoting or disrupting automatic skill execution

Modeling the relationship between self-consciousness and competition anxiety

The present study examined the relationship between self-reported levels of self-consciousness and competition anxiety among a sample of sportspeople (N = 519). We hypothesized that self-consciousness would exhibit a positive linear relationship with competition anxiety via the mediator of social anxiety and that this relationship would be moderated by gender. Path analysis using robust maximum likelihood estimator techniques in EQS were employed to examine model fit. Examination of fit indexes demonstrated that the fit of the baseline a priori model was good (Robust CFI = .98, SRMR = .06). Multigroup analyses assessing invariance across gender were conducted by imposing increasingly strict equality constraints. The models displayed good fit (CFI = .96, SRMR = .08); however, inspection of the Lagrange multiplier test and then single sample models revealed the path between social anxiety and somatic anxiety was stronger for females. We concluded that the relationship between self-consciousness and competition anxiety is mediated by the experience of social anxiety; however, the present findings refute the hypothesis that the relationship is moderated by gender

Attentional focus, dispositional reinvestment, and skilled motor performance under pressure

Copyright @ 2006 Human KineticsAttentional processes governing skilled motor behavior were examined in two studies. In Experiment 1, field hockey players performed a dribbling task under single-task, dual-task, and skill-focused conditions under both low and high pressure situations. In Experiment 2, skilled soccer players performed a dribbling task under single-task, skill-focused, and process-goal conditions, again under low and high pressure situations. Results replicated recent findings regarding the detrimental effect of skill-focused attention and the facilitative effect of dual-task conditions on skilled performance. In addition, focusing on movement related process goals was found to adversely affect performance. Support for the predictive validity of the Reinvestment Scale was also found, with high reinvesters displaying greater susceptibility to skill failure under pressure. Results were consistent with explicit monitoring theories of choking and are further discussed in light of the conceptual distinction between explicit monitoring and reinvestment of conscious control

Learning from experience: the case study of a primary school

This thesis is a case study about learning from experience in a primary school. The enquiry applies a psychoanalytic idea in an educational context. The focus arose from Bion’s idea: ‘Container-contained’ (Bion, 1962) which proposes that the capacity to think is emotionally rooted in our first relationship, which informs the qualities of our subsequent ‘learning relationships’ (Youell, 2006). Within a psychosocial, interpretivist framework, research questions ask: How does the learning that children bring to school affect their relationships and learning? How can school provide flexible-enough containment for thinking and learning from experience? What have I learnt about learning from experience? As a researcher/mentor, an interpretation of Bick’s (1964) clinical observational method was deployed to generate data, including written-up observations of four case study children who communicated their stories of everyday events in school during mentoring sessions. An auto/biographical approach complementarily composed part of the methodological bricolage. The inductive method supported evolution of a relational approach to mentoring, permitting reflexive interrogation of the observational texts. Interviews with teachers and parents added a biographical dimension. Mentoring took place during half-hour, weekly, individual mentoring sessions with children over two terms. Findings confirmed that children brought early experiences of learning to school which affected relationships and posed barriers to learning. The research method provided a subjective tool for making unconscious qualities of relationship in the transference and countertransference between researcher, children and adults at an institutional level, explicit. RefIexive interrogation illumined the interrelationship between researcher and children’s learning. Findings showed a need for flexible boundaries for supporting children’s self-efficacy and personal agency, and teacher’s learning about learning, when school is seen as a ‘container’. Findings confirmed the need for time and space for children and adults to reflect on experience in school, towards fostering emotional well-being and the capacity to think and learn

Asymmetries of Heavy Elements in the Young Supernova Remnant Cassiopeia A

Supernova remnants (SNRs) offer the means to study supernovae (SNe) long after the original explosion and can provide a unique insight into the mechanism that governs these energetic events. In this work, we examine the morphologies of X-ray emission from different elements found in the youngest known core-collapse (CC) SNR in the Milky Way, Cassiopeia A. The heaviest elements exhibit the highest levels of asymmetry, which we relate to the burning process that created the elements and their proximity to the center of explosion. Our findings support recent model predictions that the material closest to the source of explosion will reflect the asymmetries inherent to the SN mechanism. Additionally, we find that the heaviest elements are moving more directly opposed to the neutron star (NS) than the lighter elements. This result is consistent with NS kicks arising from ejecta asymmetries.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables Updated to include an analysis of Emission Measure Maps (vs the, still-included, continuum-subtracted flux maps), used as another proxy for mass maps. The results have not changed; the emission measure maps also show increasing asymmetry with ejecta mass. (Now matches the version published in ApJ. Vol 889 Issue 2 (2020) 144

A study of sporozoan parasites of stored products Coleoptera

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