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Reducing Competitive Anxiety Cheerleader Psychology

NCT03849170 · Status: UNKNOWN · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 35

Last updated 2019-03-07

No results posted yet for this study

Summary

Cheer leading is a rapidly growing international sport known for its acrobatic skills and dangerous stunts. The sport presents ample risk for physical trauma, and it is common for athletes to miss extensive time from cheer leading due to injury. The goal of this study is to the see whether the investigators can reduce injury risk among cheer leading athletes by teaching them stress-coping skills to help them relax and reduce their sport-related stress. There exists a link between high levels of stress and increased rates of injury among athletes. When individuals become stressed during athletic events such as competitions or strenuous training, symptoms including muscle tension and narrowed attention often accompany the stress response, increasing injury risk and reducing performance quality. In this study, half of Western University's coed cheer leading team will participate in a six-session stress management intervention to teach them relevant psychological stress-coping skills. Such skills include relaxation breathing techniques, visualization exercises, stoppage of negative thoughts, and development of self-efficacy statements. The other half of the team will receive a placebo "sport nutrition" program. The sessions of both the control program and the stress-management intervention will be administered over the most intensive period of the cheer leading season, from September to November of 2019. The investigators predict that the intervention group athletes will report less cheer leading time missed due to injury, report less sport-related stress, and make fewer errors at their cheer leading championship than their teammates in the placebo group. This is the first study to administer a psychological injury-prevention intervention to cheerleaders.

Conditions

  • Sports Injury
  • Stress Reaction
  • Performance Anxiety

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Stress Inoculation Technique

Teaches athletes to use cognitive-behavioral techniques to reduce their stress response during sporting events.

OTHER

Health Intervention

Will provide basic dietary and lifestyle guidelines that athletes should follow in their daily lives to maintain their health

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • Western University, Canada

    lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

  • Harry Prapavessis, Ph.D · Western University

Study Design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
NONE
Model
PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age
17 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2019-08-31
Primary Completion
2019-11-30
Completion
2019-12-31

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Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT03849170 on ClinicalTrials.gov