Psychological Development in Youth Swimmers

Here's a great video on psychological development in youth swimmers. The speaker is Dr. Dan Gould at the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University.

I think the discussion of maintaining consistency after races is something that swimming coaches and researchers need to explore. There is always a reason to celebrate a good performance, and it's important to acknowledge that a string of good races creates a sense of positive momentum in a swimmer's mind (it can also contribute positive momentum to others by inspiring teammates). However, each race is a separate entity in a swim meet, and swimmers who are able to compartmentalize past performances (both good and bad) seem to be the most consistent performers, especially in pressure situations.

Coaching with compassion

Coaching in a positive way allows the person being coached to open up and be more perceptive. Coaching in such a way where the person being coached feels angry or guilty may cause this person to shut down. These findings come from neuro-scientists at Case Western have examined the brain's response pathways to different coaching styles. I should point out here that coaching in these cases refers more to the type of coaching you would experience in the business world... arguably, there are many carry-overs to sports coaching.

Rebuilding Team Confidence (Video)

At the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State, we have assembled a few videos regarding building team confidence. This video features Dr. Larry Lauer providing some practical advice for ice hockey coaches seeking to improve team and player confidence.

More videos will follow later this week, which I will post at this site.

Great Insights at the 2011 Midwest AASP Conference

Life skill acquisition. Sport and gender. Mental toughness. The culture of high-performance youth sport. These topics and more were discussed at the 2011 Midwest AASP conference (Feb 18-19), hosted by Miami University in Oxford, OH. The conference was heavily student-driven, and included over twenty presentations of research and research proposals. There was a strong contingent of undergraduate presenters... always good to see undergrads getting involved early. I'll discuss a few of the presentations that resonated with me in my post below.