Psychological profile and sailing performance

Abstract

Studies in competitive Sailing have centered their efforts in physiologic parameters and in the decision-making process. The purpose of the present study is to identify the main psychological factors evidenced by sailors and determine which of them better contribute to predict performance in Sailing. Forty three young sailors (32 boys and 11 girls) with ages between 10 and 15 years (M= 12.86, SD= 1.39) completed the Psychological Performance Inventory. The used statistical procedures were the Student’s t test and the multiple linear regression analysis. The psychological factors with the highest scores were motivation and self-confidence. The negativity control was defined as crucial. This variable was the only that distinguished the best sailors (top-10) from the remaining ones and the factor less valued by the sample. The only psychological variables that allowed predicting Sailing performance were visualization and motivation, evidencing the importance of these in the errors decrease, spatial definition of the regattas mark, attention control and self-referenced improvement.