Mental Imagery
Putt With Your Brain - Part 2
From: Sports Are 80 Percent Mental
If there is a poster child sport for our favorite phrase, "Sports Are 80 Percent Mental", it must be golf. Maybe its the slow pace of play that gives us plenty of time to think between shots. Maybe its the "on stage" performance feeling we get when we step up to that first tee in front of our friends (or strangers!) Maybe its the "high" of an amazing approach shot that lands 3 feet from the cup followed by the "low" of missing the birdie putt.
From any angle, a golf course is the sport psychologist's laboratory to study the mix of emotions, confidence, skill execution and internal cognitive processes that are needed to avoid buying rounds at the 19th hole. Last time, we looked at some of the recent research on putting mechanics, but, as promised, we now turn to the mental side of putting.
Sian Beilock and her team at the University of Chicago's Human Performance Lab
recently released the latest of a string of research studies on sports
performance, or more specifically, how not to choke under pressure.
Lucky for us, they chose putting as their sport skill of choice. This
ties in with Dr. Beilock's theory of embodied cognition that we
featured in Watching Sports Is Good For Your Brain.
An underlying theme to this work is the concept of automaticity,
or the ability to carry out sport skills without consciously thinking
about them. Performing below expectations (i.e. choking) starts when we
allow our minds to step out of this automatic mode and start thinking
about the steps to our putting stroke and all of those "swing thoughts"
that come with it ("keep your elbows in", "head down", "straight
back").
Our brain over analyzes and second-guesses the motor skills we
have learned from hundreds of practice putts. Previously, we looked at automaticity in other sports.
Of course, a key distinction to the definition of choking is that you
are playing "well below expectations". If you normally shoot par, but
now start missing easy putts, then there may be distractions that are
taking you out of your normal flow. Choking implies a temporary and
abnormal event. Automaticity theory would claim that it is these
distractions from some perceived pressure to perform that are affecting
your game.
Most research into sport skill performance divides the world into two
groups, novices and experts. Most sports have their own measures of
where the dividing line is between these groups. Expertise would imply
performance results not just experience. So, a golfer who has been
hacking away for 20 years but still can't break 100 would still be put
in the "novice" category.
Sport scientists design experiments that
compare performance between the groups given some variables, and then
hypothesize on the reason for the observed differences. Beilock, et al
have looked at golf putting from several different angles over the
years. Their research builds on itself, so let's review in reverse
chronological order.
Back in 2001, they began by comparing the two competing theories
of choking, distraction theory vs. explicit monitoring theory, and
designed a putting experiment to find the better explanation.
Distraction theory explains choking by assuming that the task of putting requires your direct attention and that high pressure situations will cause you to perform dual tasks - focus on your putting but also think about the pressure. This theory assumes there is no automaticity in skill learning and that we have to focus our attention on the skill every time.
Explicit monitoring theory claims that over
time, as we practice a skill to the point of becoming an "expert", we
proceduralize the task so that it becomes "automatic". Then, during a
high pressure situation, our brain becomes so concerned about
performance that it takes us out of automatic mode and tries to focus
on each step of the task. The research supported the explicit
monitoring theory as it was shown that the golf putting task was
affected by distractions and pressure for the experts but not the
novice putters.
So, how do we block out the pressure, so that our automaticity can kick in? Another 2001 study by Beilock
looked at mental imagery during putting. Using the same explicit
monitoring theory, should we try to think positive thoughts, like "this
ball is going in the hole" or "I have made this putt many times"? Also,
what happens if a stray negative thought, "don't miss this one!" enters
our brain? Should we try to suppress it and replace it with happy
self-talk?
She set up four groups, one receiving positive comments, one receiving negative comments, one receiving negative comments followed by positive comments and one receiving none as a control group. As expected, the happy people did improve their putting over the course of the trials, while the negative imagery hurt performance.
But, the
negative replaced with positive thought group did not show any more
improvement over the control group. So, when faced with a high
pressure, stressful situation ripe with the possibilities of choking,
try to repeat positive thoughts, but don't worry too much if the
occasional doubt creeps in.
Our strategy towards putting should also vary depending on our current
skill level. While learning the intricacies of putting, novices should
use different methods than experts, according to a 2004 study by Beilock, et al.
Novice golfers need to pay attention to the step by step components of
their swing, and they perform better when they do focus on the
declarative knowledge required.
Expert golfers, however, have practiced
their swing or putt so often that it has become "second nature" to the
point that if they are told to focus on the individual components of
their swing, they perform poorly. The experiment asked both novices and
expert golfers to first focus on their actual putting stroke by saying
the word "straight" when hitting the ball and to notice the alignment
of the putter face with the ball.
Next, they were asked to putt while also listening for a certain tone played in the background. When they heard the tone they were to call it out while putting. The first scenario, known as "skill-focused", caused the novices to putt more accurately but the experts to struggle. The second scenario, called "dual-task", distracted the novices enough to affect their putts, while the experts were not bothered and their putting accuracy was better.
Beilock showed that novices need the task focus to succeed while they
are learning to putt, while experts have internalized the putting
stroke so that even when asked to do two things, the putting stroke can
be put on "auto-pilot".
Finally, in 2008, Beilock's team added one more twist
to this debate. Does a stress factor even affect a golfer's performance
in their mind before they putt? This time, golfers, divided into the
usual novice and expert groups, were asked to first imagine or "image
execute" themselves making a putt followed by an actual putt. The
stress factor was to perform one trial under a normal, "take all the
time you need" time scenario and then another under a speeded or
time-limited scenario.
The novices performed better under the
non-hurried scenario in imagining the putt first followed by the actual
putt. The experts, however, actually did better in the hurried scenario
and worse in the relaxed setting. Again, the automaticity factor
explains the differences between the groups.
The bottom line throughout all of these studies is that if you're
learning to play golf, which includes putting, you should focus on your
swing/stroke but beware of the distractions which will take away your
concentration. That seems pretty logical, but for those that normally
putt very well, if you feel stress to sink that birdie putt, don't try
to focus in on the mechanics of your stroke. Trust the years of
experience that has taught your brain the combination of sensorimotor
skills of putting.
Just remember the Chevy Chase/Ty Webb philosophy;
"I'm going to give you a little advice. There's a force in the universe
that makes things happen. And all you have to do is get in touch with
it, stop thinking, let things happen, and be the ball.... Nah-na-na-na,
Ma-na-na-na...."
Sian L. Beilock, Thomas H. Carr (2001). On the fragility of skilled performance: What governs choking under pressure? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 130 (4), 701-725 DOI: 10.1037//0096-3445.130.4.701
Sian
L. Beilock; James A. Afremow; Amy L. Rabe; Thomas H. Carr (2001).
"Don't Miss!" The Debilitating Effects of Suppressive Imagery on Golf
Putting Performance Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology, 23 (3)
Beilock
S.L.; Bertenthal B.I.; McCoy A.M.; Carr T.H. (2004). Haste does not
always make waste: Expertise, direction of attention, and speed versus
accuracy in performing sensorimotor skills Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 11 (2), 373-379
Sian
Beilock, Sara Gonso (2008). Putting in the mind versus putting on the
green: Expertise, performance time, and the linking of imagery and
action The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 61 (6), 920-932 DOI: 10.1080/17470210701625626
Putt With Your Brain - Part 1
From: Sports Are 80 Percent Mental
If Mark Twain thinks golf is "a good walk spoiled", then putting must be a brief pause to make you reconsider ever walking again. With about 50% of our score being determined on the green, we are constantly in search of the "secret" to getting the little white ball to disappear into the cup.
Lucky for us, there is no shortage of really smart people also
looking for the answer. The first 8 months of 2008 have been no
exception, with a golf cart full of research papers on just the topic
of putting.
Is the secret in the mechanics of the putt stroke or maybe
the cognitive set-up to the putt or even the golfer's psyche when
stepping up to the ball? This first post will focus on the mechanical
side and then we'll follow-up next time with a look inside the golfer's
mind.
Let's start with a tip that most golf instructors would give, "Keep
your head still when you putt". Jack Nicklaus said it in 1974, "the
premier technical cause of missed putts is head movement" (from "Golf My Way") and Tiger Woods said it in 2001, "Every good putter keeps the head absolutely still from start to finish" (from "How I Play Golf").
Who would argue with the two greatest golfers of all time? His name is Professor Timothy Lee,
from McMaster University, and he wanted to test that observation. So,
he gathered two groups of golfers, amateurs with handicaps of 12-40,
and professionals with scratch handicaps. Using an infrared tracking
system, his team tracked the motion of the putter head and the golfer's
head during sixty putts.
As predicted, the amateurs' head moved back in unison with their putter
head, something Lee calls an "allocentric" movement, which agrees with
the advice that novice golfers move their head. However, the expert
golfers did not keep their head still, but rather moved their heads
slightly in the opposite direction of the putter head.
On the
backswing, the golfer's head moved slightly forward; on the forward
stroke, the head moved slightly backward. This "egocentric" movement
may be the more natural response to maintain a centered, balanced
stance throughout the stroke. "The exact reasons for the opposite
coordination patterns are not entirely clear," explains Lee. "However,
we suspect that the duffers tend to just sway their body with the
motions of the putter.
In contrast, the good golfers probably are
trying to maintain a stable, central body position by counteracting the
destabilization caused by the putter backswing with a forward motion of
the head. The direction of head motion is then reversed when the putter
moves forward to strike the ball." Does that mean that pro golfers like
Tiger are not keeping their heads still? No, just that you may not have to keep your head perfectly still to putt effectively.
So, what if you do have the bad habit of moving your head? Just teach
yourself to change your putting motion and you will be cutting strokes
off of your score, right? Well, not so fast. Simon Jenkins of Leeds Metropolitan University tested 15
members of the PGA European Tour to see if they could break old
physical habits during putting. His team found that players who usually
use shoulder movement in their putting action were not able to change
their ways even when instructed to use a different motion. Old habits
die hard.
Let's say you do keep your head still (nice job!), but you still 3-putt
most greens? What's the next step on the road to birdie putts? Of the
three main components of a putt, (angle of the face of the putter head
on contact, putting stroke path and the impact point on the putter),
which has the greatest effect on success?
Back in February, Jon Karlsen of the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences
in Oslo, asked 71 elite golfers (mean handicap of 1.8) to make a total
of 1301 putts (why not just 1300?) from about 12 feet to find out. His
results showed that face angle was the most important (80%), followed
by putter path (17%) and impact point (3%).
OK, forget the moving head thing and work on your putter blade angle at
contact and you will be taking honors at every tee. Wait, Jon Karlsen
came back in July with an update.
This time he compared green reading, putting technique and green
surface inconsistencies to see which of those variables we should
discuss with our golf pro. Forty-three expert golfers putted 50 times
from varying distances. Results showed that green reading (60%) was the
most dominant factor for success with technique (34%) and green
inconsistency (6%) trailing significantly.
So, after reading all of this, all you really need is something like the BreakMaster,
which will help you read the breaks and the slope to the hole! Then,
keep the putter blade square to the ball and don't move your head, at
least not in an allocentric way, that is if you can break your bad
habit of doing it. No problem, right? Well, next time we'll talk about
your brain's attitude towards putting and all the ways your putt could
go wrong before you even hit it!
Timothy
D. Lee, Tadao Ishikura, Stefan Kegel, Dave Gonzalez, Steven Passmore
(2008). Head–Putter Coordination Patterns in Expert and Less Skilled
Golfers Journal of Motor Behavior, 40 (4), 267-272 DOI: 10.3200/JMBR.40.4.267-272
Jenkins, Simon (2008). Can Elite Tournament Professional Golfers Prevent Habitual Actions in Their Putting Actions? International Journal of Sports Science & Coaching, 3 (1), 117-127
Jon Karlsen, Gerald Smith, Johnny Nilsson (2007). The stroke has only a minor influence on direction consistency in golf putting among elite players Journal of Sports Sciences, 26 (3), 243-250 DOI: 10.1080/02640410701530902
Imagine Winning Gold In Beijing
Sports Are 80 Percent Mental
Imagine winning a gold medal at the Beijing Olympics.
No really, go ahead, close your eyes and visualize it. What did you
see? Were you standing on the medal platform looking out at the crowd,
waving and taking in the scene through your own eyes, or were you a
spectator in the crowd watching yourself getting the medal put around
your neck? This choice between "first-person" or "third-person"
visualization actually makes a difference on our motivation to achieve
a future goal.
Noelia A. Vasquez, at York University and
Roger Buehler, at Wilfrid Laurier University wanted to see if there was
a link between our visualization perspective and our motivation level
to achieve the imagined goal. They asked 47 university students to
imagine the successful completion of a performance task that was in
their near future, whether it be a speech in a class or an upcoming
athletic competition. They were also asked to assume that the task
went extremely well. One group of students were asked to imagine this
scene "through their own eyes" seeing the environment as they would
actually experience it. The second group was told to use the
third-person perspective, pretending they were "in the crowd" watching
themselves as others would see them achieving this goal. Next, they
were given a survey that asked each group how motivated they were to
now go make this successful scene a reality.
As
hypothesized, the group that saw the scene through their audience's
eyes (third-person) ranked their motivation to now succeed
significantly higher than those that imagined it through their own eye
(first-person). The authors' explanation for this is the perceived
additional importance attached to the task when we consider other
peoples' opinion of us and our natural desire to increase our status in
our peer group. Seeing this newly elevated social acceptance and
approval of ourselves from the eyes of our peers motivates us even more
to reach for our goals.
The road to achievements like an
Olympic gold medal is a long one with many steps along the way. Over
the years, as athletes maintain their training regimen, they can keep
imagining the future goal, but they may need to also look back and
recognize the improvements they have made over time. This "progress to
date" assessment will also provide motivation to keep going once they
realize the hard work is actually having the desired effect and moving
them along the desired path. So, as they review their past to present
progress, does the first or third person perspective make a difference
there as well?
Researchers from Cornell, Yale and Ohio State, led by Thomas Gilovich,
professor of psychology at Cornell, designed an experiment to find
out. They recruited a group of university students who had described
their high-school years as "socially awkward" to now recall those years
and compare them with their social skill in college. The first group
was asked to recall the past from a first-person perspective, just as
their memories would provide them. The second group was asked to
remember themselves through the perspective of their classmates
(third-person). Next, each group was asked to assess the personal
change they had accomplished since then.
As predicted,
the group that had recalled their former selves in the third person
reported greater progress and change towards a more social and accepted
person in college than the group that remembered in the first-person.
"We have found that perspective can influence your interpretation of
past events. In a situation in which change is likely, we find that
observing yourself as a third person -- looking at yourself from an
outside observer's perspective -- can help accentuate the changes
you've made more than using a first-person perspective," says
Gilovich. "When participants recalled past awkwardness from a
third-person perspective, they felt they had changed and were now more
socially skilled," said Lisa K. Libby,
an assistant professor of psychology at Ohio State University. "That
led them to behave more sociably and appear more socially skilled to
the research assistant."
So, whether looking forward or
backward, seeing yourself through other's eyes seems to provide more
motivation to not only continue the road to success, but to appreciate
the progress you have made.
Then the actual day of competition arrives. It is one hour before you take your position on the starting blocks at the "Bird's Nest" stadium in Beijing or on the mat at the National Indoor Stadium
for the gymnastics final. Should you be imagining the medal ceremony
and listening to your country's national anthem at that point? In a
recent Denver Post article,
Peter Haberl, senior sports psychologist for the U.S. Olympic Committee
says, "It takes a great deal of ability and skill to stay focused on
the task at hand." He distinguishes between an "outcome" goal,
(receiving the medal) and "performance" (improving scores/times) and
"process" (improving technique) goals. "The difference is that these
types of goals are much more under the control of the athlete,"
explains Haberl. "The process goal, in particular, directs attention to
the here and now, which allows the athlete to totally focus on the
doing of the activity; this is key to performing well. This sounds
simple but it really is quite difficult because the mind takes you to
the past and the future all the time, particularly in the Olympic
environment with its plethora of distractions and enticing rewards."
Mental imagery is a well-known tool for every athlete to make distant
and difficult goals seem attainable. By seeing your future
accomplishments through the eyes of others, you can attach more
importance and reward to achieving them. Just imagine yourself in London in 2012!
Vasquez, N.A. (2007). Seeing Future Success: Does Imagery Perspective
Influence Achievement Motivation?. Personality and Social Psychology
Bulletin, 33(10), 1392-1405.
Libby, L.K., Eibach, R.P.,
Gilovich, T. (2005). Here's Looking at Me: The Effect of Memory
Perspective on Assessments of Personal Change.. Journal of Personality
and Social Psychology, 88(1), 50-62. DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.88.1.50
