Date of Completion

Spring 4-26-2018

Thesis Advisor(s)

Haim Bar

Honors Major

Statistics

Disciplines

Applied Statistics | Comparative Psychology | Design of Experiments and Sample Surveys

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to find whether or not sports psychology can be effective. Baseball was chosen as the sport for the study because baseball can be analyzed for nearly every single factor of the game, with the exception of the mental readiness or state of the player when he steps onto the field. It therefore provides the optimal atmosphere to provide clinical and statistical support to the field of sports psychology. Despite the various, numerous pieces of literature that praise and show support for sports psychology, there hasn’t been clinical research to support it. Additionally, multiple sports psychologists that work with baseball teams, including Harvey Dorfman and Ken Ravizza, have said that the greatest baseball players are the ones who work on their mental conditioning. Charlie Maher, a sports psychologist for the Indians, said “The focus of sports psychology in baseball is much more on performance, on development and improvement.” (Lemire) Concluding from those expert opinions, this study could be particularly useful for the sport of baseball. The book The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey was chosen as the book of implementation because of its relative brevity and reading level, which would be useful for the student-athletes because of their busy schedules and time commitments, as well as its renowned ability, sworn on by people like Pete Carroll, Lawrence Jackson, Jimmy Rollins, to name a few. The book provided a simple way to implement sports psychology on the participants. It is important to note that the author emphasizes that reading the book and following its practices doesn’t mean that an individual’s wins will improve, but rather their overall performance and ability. The hope of this study was to show substantial statistical evidence in favor of sports psychology, so that its implementation and use could be backed by physical science and numbers.

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