A Study of the Possible Role of Mental Skills Training in the Comparative Performances of Three Caribbean Netball Teams
Mar 10, 2021 | Views:208854 |
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Office of Research, Impact and Postgraduate Studies
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A Study of the Possible Role of Mental Skills Training in the Comparative Performances of Three Caribbean Netball Teams
An Oral Defence by Ms. Bridget Adams
Netball is a sport traditionally played by women and girls in a rapid-moving competitive environment, which requires high levels of physicality in its players, as well as the employment of technical and mental skills. This study examines the ethnological approach to Mental Skills Use (MS) within three elite netball countries in the Caribbean - Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago. These Caribbean countries aspire to compete regionally and internationally every two (2) or four (4) years respectively. During these tournaments, Jamaica is ranked highest in the Caribbean, with Trinidad and Tobago playing almost on the same level with Barbados, something unheard of previously. Coaches and players from the three countries anecdotally employ different levels of training in the use of Mental Skills (MST). This was investigated more formally in this study as a possible source of Jamaica's success.
Thematic Analysis revealed that even the less experienced OECS coaches were practicing MS use in an informal way themselves, although not training players in its use like more experienced coaches. Statistical data analysis, including Correlation, multifactor ANOVA and ANCOVA (GLM), and Regression Analysis, was used to look at associations of MS use in different contexts, the impacts of demographics (including team) on type and level of players' MS use and the impacts of MS use in earlier contexts, and Anxiety on MS use on the competition court. It was concluded that Jamaica's success was not due to its players MS use, but due to their favourable Anxiety profiles, which showed them, on average, to be less susceptible to negative stress and more positively excited during competition matches.
Ms. BRIDGET ADAMS, Head Coach of the High Performance Netball Team at The University of Trinidad and Tobago (UTT), holds an Executive Masters in Sports Management. She is a certified Level II netball coach and a coach presenter, as well as a part-time lecturer and CSEC moderator for Physical Education. Ms. Adams has represented Trinidad and Tobago in many Caribbean Championships and at three (3) World Netball Tournaments in Singapore, Scotland and England. She has also captained the West Indies netball team, as well as the national team at every level. Ms. Adams won the Individual Shooting Competition at the Caribbean Championships for seven (7) consecutive years, once with a perfect score of twenty goals - a record no one has tied to-date. She was awarded the WITCO Sportswoman of the Year and the Southern Sports Personality of the Year Award in 1991. Ms. Adams was inducted into her Alma Mater's, St. James Government Secondary's, Wall of Fame and in November 2015, she was inducted into the First Citizens (FCB) Sports Foundation Hall of Fame as a "Player".
Wednesday 10th March, 2021 at 1:00 p.m.
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