Zhao Jing, Yang Yuhan, Zhang Heng, Nie Yu, Wang Qiulin
Harbin Institute of Technology, Haerbin, China.
College of Physical Education, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, Jiangsu, China.
Front Psychol. 2025 Aug 21;16:1596298. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1596298. eCollection 2025.
Under high-pressure situations, such as crucial games, some athletes often underperform. This is the case even for exceptional athletes in critical moments of competition. Athletes often experience performance anxiety, which creates attentional errors and underperformance. Attentional bias, where emotional stimuli influence decision-making, may also result in selective attention to negative information. Attentional bias correction training (ABMT) aims to modify these attention patterns with the aim of alleviating anxiety symptoms. In this study, we investigated the pre-competition attention patterns among high-level athletes to enhance performance.
Attentional bias correction training was employed to train 32 athletes for 4 weeks, every 2 days (emotional pictures for the experimental group and star pictures for the control group). A point detection paradigm was also utilized to test the athletes' attentional bias behavior in a pre-competition anxiety situation before and after training.
The results revealed a significant main effect of test time on self-rated anxiety level of high-level athletes ((1, 32) = 204.072, < 0.001, ηp = 0.919), while the main effect of group was not significant ((1, 32) = 0.505, > 0.05, ηp = 0.025). Moreover, significant interaction was recorded between the test time and group ((1, 32) = 124.895, < 0.001, ηp = 0.874). In the simple effects analysis, high-level athletes in the experimental group had significantly lower pre-competition anxiety scores at the post-test than at the pre-test (43.90 ± 2.57 vs. 57.00 ± 2.77, < 0.001). However, for the control group, there was no significant difference between the two groups (52.20 ± 2.57 vs. 53.80 ± 2.77, = 0.133). In addition, the attentional bias scores were significantly different before and after the training (5.985 ± 1.045 vs. -0.613 ± 0.60, < 0.05) in the experimental group, whereas there were no significant differences in the control group (7.813 ± 1.045 vs. 5.773 ± 0.613, > 0.05).
The present findings demonstrate that attentional bias correction training can effectively reduce pre-match anxiety and attentional bias toward negative information in high-level athletes. These results provide an important foundation for enhancing pre-competition attention training and mood regulation in athletes. Future research should explore the underlying mechanisms and practical applications of these findings to facilitate the development of strategies to improve pre-match attention training.
在高压情况下，如关键比赛中，一些运动员常常表现不佳。即使是优秀运动员在比赛关键时刻也会出现这种情况。运动员经常会经历表现焦虑，这会导致注意力错误和表现不佳。注意偏向，即情绪刺激影响决策，也可能导致对负面信息的选择性关注。注意偏向矫正训练（ABMT）旨在改变这些注意模式，以减轻焦虑症状。在本研究中，我们调查了高水平运动员赛前的注意模式，以提高表现。
采用注意偏向矫正训练对32名运动员进行为期4周的训练，每2天训练一次（实验组观看情绪图片，对照组观看明星图片）。还利用点探测范式测试运动员在训练前后赛前焦虑情境下的注意偏向行为。
结果显示，测试时间对高水平运动员自评焦虑水平有显著主效应（（1, 32） = 204.072， < 0.001，ηp = 0.919），而组间主效应不显著（（1, 32） = 0.505， > 0.05，ηp = 0.025）。此外，测试时间与组间存在显著交互作用（（1, 32） = 124.895， < 0.001，ηp = 0.874）。在简单效应分析中，实验组高水平运动员在测试后赛前焦虑得分显著低于测试前（43.90 ± 2.57 vs. 57.00 ± 2.77， < 0.001）。然而，对照组两组之间无显著差异（52.20 ± 2.57 vs. 53.80 ± 2.77， = 0.133）。此外，实验组训练前后注意偏向得分有显著差异（5.985 ± 1.045 vs. -0.613 ± 0.60， < 0.05），而对照组无显著差异（7.813 ± 1.045 vs. 5.773 ± 0.613， > 0.05）。
本研究结果表明，注意偏向矫正训练可以有效降低高水平运动员赛前焦虑以及对负面信息的注意偏向。这些结果为加强运动员赛前注意力训练和情绪调节提供了重要基础。未来研究应探索这些发现的潜在机制和实际应用，以促进提高赛前注意力训练策略的发展。
