Volume 6, Issue 1

Current imagery literature suggests that imagery perspectives may be subject to a default position (Morris & Spittle, 2001), with experience influencing how successfully individuals can utilize internal and external visual imagery. According to this proposition, the default imagery perspective is an internal 1st person perspective. However, few imagery inventories have been designed to differentiate and accurately measure these imagery perspectives (see Morris, Spittle, & Watt, 2005). Fewer still have considered athletic populations, in particular adolescent cohorts. Consequently, the current research examined the use of internal visual imagery (IVI), external visual imagery (EVI), and kinesthetic imagery (KI) amongst adolescent sport performers and whether the amount of hours engaged in practice outside of competition influenced their adoption. Eighty-seven (36 male, 51 female) county level participants from sports academies in the United Kingdom (M age = 14.0, SD = 1.92), from 6 interactive sports, completed the Vividness of Movement Imagery Questionnaire-2 (VMIQ-2; Roberts et al., 2008). Participants were grouped relative to the amount of practice they had engaged in since playing their current sport competitively. A repeated measures ANOVA recorded significant differences amongst participants vividness of imagery, Wilkes’ ? F (2, 85) = 3.166, p < 0.05, ?² = .07, post hoc pairwise comparisons using a Bonferroni adjustment revealed no significant differences between sub-scales. Results to MANOVA recorded no significant differences between VMIQ-2 sub-scales and three accumulated practice groupings, Wilkes’ ? F (3, 82) = 436.14, p > 0.32, ?² = .04. The results demonstrate adolescent sport performers possess between clear and reasonably vivid to moderately clear and vivid imagery ability when using IVI, EVI, and KI. Future research should consider the impact of environmental factors that influence the development of these modalities and perspectives.

Four experienced golfers participated in a multiple-baseline across participant design that examined the efficacy of solution-focused guided imagery (SFGI) as a treatment for Type I yips. Data was collected during actual 9-hole golf matches and participants received five interventions of the SFGI protocol. Results supported previous research that found SFGI to decrease yips. The current study extended past research by showing that the SFGI protocol was effective with multiple facilitators. Maintenance data collected 12-14 weeks post intervention also extended generalization over time. Results suggest that researchers should examine the effects of similar SFGI protocol on individuals experiencing task-specific focal hand dystonia across tasks (e.g., musicians, tennis players).

This study investigated the relationship between positive affect (PA), negative affect (NA), and subsequent imagery use outside of a sports competitive setting. Participants from a United Kingdom university included 117 individuals (71 male, 46 female), with a mean age of 19.11 (SD = 1.74), from a number of sports (e.g., rugby, football, netball, athletics, cricket), completed the Sport Imagery Questionnaire (SIQ; Hall et al., 1998) and Positive Affect Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson et al., 1988). Repeated measures ANOVA demonstrated significant differences in participants’ imagery use, Wilks’ ? F (4, 113) = 21.715, p = < 0.01, ?² = .44, with pairwise comparisons using a Bonferroni adjustment of p = 0.01 recording significant differences in SIQ subscale ratings. To analyse the extent PA and NA predict functions of imagery use five hierarchical regressions were performed. The results demonstrate PA more so than NA influences the SIQ’s motivational imagery functions. Neither PA nor NA acted as predictors for the SIQ’s cognitive subscales. To account for the specificity of this relationship the authors propose a model to guide future research.