Influence of motivational climate conditions on Army cadet shooters' efficacy, attentional focus, and performance
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abstract
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Researchers have recently shown elite shooters' self-efficacy, heart/respiratory rates, and attentional focus measured with eye tracking are uniquely related to performance. Furthermore, qualitative research has highlighted the importance of coaches to prepare shooters to handle the effects of anxiety on their performance. Sport psychology researchers experimentally manipulating the motivational climate to be either ego-involving (i.e., ability-focused) or caring/task-involving (i.e., supportive and effort/improvement-focused) have shown differences in participants' objective measures of performance and stress response (self-report and physiological). However, military, marksmanship, and sport psychology researchers have yet to include the motivational climate, psychophysiological responses, and attentional focus in a single study examining individuals' resultant, objective performance. In collaboration with Army ROTC, we have proposed an interdisciplinary, experimental study to examine how the ego-involving and caring/task-involving motivational climate experiences differentially influence cadets' psychophysiological responses (e.g., efficacy, heart/respiratory rates) and attentional focus (i.e., quiet eye with eye-tracking) during three shooting tasks, and ultimately, their shooting performance. This study will help explain the mechanisms through which the leader-created motivational climate influences cadets' shooting performance. We will present these recommendations for optimizing cadets' training experience to the senior cadets entering the Army as officers upon graduation and the ROTC faculty.
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