SPORTS IMAGERY ABILITY AND PERFORMANCE OF VOLLEYBALL ATHLETES IN MONKAYO DISTRICT

Abstract

Sports imagery is one of the identified techniques in applied psychology which is believed to be effective towards improving one’s sporting performance. In today’s high competition in sporting world, athletes who used another technique to enhance the performance are superior to those who rely only in physical training. Mental practice improves performance significantly more than no practice at all (Taylor, 2018). The study determined the significant relationship of sports imagery to performance. It involved fifty-six (56) athletes particularly volleyball players in Monkayo District using a descriptive-correlation research design. The study used a standardized questionnaire by Peltomaki (2014) to identify the sports imagery of the athletes and an actual game observation was performed to determine the performance of the athletes. Data revealed that the number of years playing and level of competition played had significant difference to sports imagery and performance but not with sex. It was also found out that sports imagery is correlated with performance. It means that the performance of the athletes is dependent to their sports imagery ability. Thus, the more one can imagine strategizing the game, practice the skill in mind, specific goal- oriented and motivated when playing, the better is the performance. Mental training program should be given emphasis to improve performance of the athletes.