How to stay calm under pressure - Noa Kageyama and Pen-Pen Chen

Scientific concepts, discoveries, and nature of the phenomenon

• Choking under pressure
  • Failure to perform at one’s usual level at crucial moments despite extensive practice.
  • Common in high-stakes settings (e.g., sports), and also linked to performance anxiety in other domains such as:
    • public speaking
    • spelling bees
    • musicians

Theoretical explanations for choking

Distraction theories (attention/focus is disrupted)

• Under pressure, the mind becomes preoccupied with worries, doubts, or fears rather than the task.
• Competing thoughts reduce available attentional resources because the brain has limited capacity.
• Working memory (a temporary “mental scratch pad” for holding information) is especially vulnerable under pressure.

2004 study (math under stress):

• University students solved math problems that varied in difficulty and memory demands.
• Introducing stakes/stress reduced performance specifically on:
  • harder, memory-intensive problems
• Easy problems remained comparatively fine.

Explicit monitoring theories (overthinking/analysing interferes)

• Pressure causes people to overanalyze an action that is usually automatic.
• When a skill becomes consciously monitored, reinvestigating its mechanics can disrupt execution.

Competitive golfers study:

• Performance was compared between:
  • simply focusing on accurate putting
  • being primed to notice/monitor the precise mechanics of the putting stroke
• Because golfers typically putt largely subconsciously, shifting attention to mechanics worsened accuracy.

Who is more likely to choke

Increased susceptibility is associated with being:

• self-conscious
• anxious
• afraid of negative evaluation/judgment

Strategies to reduce choking (with study-based support)

Practice under stressful conditions

• Expert dart players study:
  • Those who hadn’t practiced under stress performed worse when anxious.
  • Those accustomed to pressure held up better.

Use a pre-performance routine

• Examples mentioned:
  • deep breathing
  • cue words
  • rhythmic movement sequences
• Studies in golf, bowling, and water polo:
  • short rituals improved performance consistency and accuracy under pressure.

Adopt an external focus (goal-focused) rather than internal mechanics focus

• External attention on the outcome/ultimate goal improves execution.

Experienced golfers study (chip shots):

• Better performance when focused on the flight of the ball
• Than on arm-motion mechanics

Researchers or sources featured

• 2004 study (university students solving math under stress): researchers not named in the subtitles.
• Competitive golfers study (putting accuracy under focus vs mechanics priming): researchers not named in the subtitles.
• Expert dart players study (practice under stress vs performance under anxiety): researchers not named in the subtitles.
• Studies on golfing, bowling, and water polo (pre-performance routines/rituals): researchers not named in the subtitles.
• Experienced golfers study (external vs internal focus for chip shots): researchers not named in the subtitles.
• Researchers mentioned by affiliation/name in the video title:
  • Noa Kageyama
  • Pen-Pen Chen