Alleviating Choking Under Pressure Using Imagery

The main purpose of the current research was to investigate a novel approach to prevent choking under pressure using a sensorimotor task. Choking is defined as suboptimal performance in situations filled with performance pressure. Three main experiments were conducted to systematically give rise to performance decrements and to, subsequently, use imagery practice to prevent such choking. Experiment 1 served to replicate the commonly-found interaction between direction of attention and the cognitive demands of the task. Here, novice golfers were found to perform optimally under skill-focused attention but suboptimally when concurrently doing an auditory word monitoring task while the opposite pattern emerged for expert golfers. Experiment 2a sought to establish an equally high level of performance pressure as perceived by participants putting in scenarios induced with outcome and monitoring pressure and a significantly higher level of perceived pressure than other participants putting in the no pressure control condition. Experiment 2b, then, provided further support for the recent finding of an interaction between type of pressure and the cognitive demands of a task. Novice golfers, for which putting represents a working memory - reliant task, exhibited choking under outcome but not under monitoring pressure whereas the opposite trend was found for the expert group.

Finally, Experiment 3 set out to test whether imagery practice, in particular, first- and third-person imagery, affected performance as a function of skill level when performing in a single-task (i.e., no pressure) and a pressure-filled environment. Importantly, choking, as had been found for novices under outcome and experts under monitoring pressure, was prevented using a brief introduction and one block practice session of imagery practice. In particular, it was found that when novices imagined themselves make a successful putt from a third-person perspective, their performance no longer fell prey to the negative effects of perceived outcome pressure. In the same vein, experts who used first-person imagery performed optimally under those conditions of monitoring pressure that had previously been found harmful of their putting performance.

Importantly, this research showed that choking under pressure can be prevented through imagery practice, and is best used when matching visual imagery perspective to the cognitive demands of the performer. These results are further discussed in light of current theory of choking under pressure, in particular, self-focus theory and the distraction hypothesis.