Transcript
CAROLINE HEANEY
In this video, we're going to explore some of the models have been used to explain psychological responses to sport injury. The first group of models we're going to look at are grief response models, which is sometimes called stage models. Grief response models assume that an athlete will react to an injury in a similar way to which an individual might respond to a significant loss, such as the death of a loved one. This suggests the injury constitutes a form of loss to the individual.
Kubler-Ross's 1969 grief response model, which was originally developed to explain responses to terminal illness, has been commonly used in early psychology of sport injury research. The model is comprised of five stages, denial, anger, depression, bargaining, and acceptance. She suggested that following injury all athletes regress through each of the five stages in order.
Whilst these models are intuitively appealing, they do have limitations. The main limitation is their rigidity. They assume that every athlete is the same and that consequently all athletes respond to injury in the same stereotypical way. In practise, this is simply not the case. Different people respond to injury in different ways. For example, one person may be totally devastated by an injury whilst another person with the same injury who has been underperforming may see the injury as an escape from or an excuse from that poor performance. Such an athlete is unlikely to demonstrate, for example, a period of depression. Because they may actually be quite happy about being injured.
Due to these limitations, cognitive appraisal models have come to be more widely accepted as models of psychological response to sport injury. In contrast to grief response models, cognitive appraisal models take individual differences into account. They do not assume that all athletes respond in the same way to injury. Instead, they suggest how an individual appraises the injury will dictate their psychological responses. It is therefore the perception of an injury that affects psychological responses rather than the injury itself.
Brewer's 1994 cognitive appraisal model shown on screen now suggests how an individual appraises their injury, their cognitive appraisal, is influenced by two variables, personal factors and situational factors. Personal factors include things such as personality, age, and previous experiences of injury. Situational factors include things like the stage of the competitive year and social influences, such as the coach or teammates' reaction to an injury.
The model suggests how an individual appraises their injury, their cognitive appraisal, dictates that psychological or emotional response to the injury. The model further proposes that these emotional responses will affect the individual's behaviour in relation to the injury, for example whether or not they will adhere to their injury rehabilitation programme.
Brewer's model is a fairly simplistic cognitive appraisal model. In contrast, the integrated model of psychological response to sports injury is a more comprehensive model that has been widely adopted in sport injury psychology research. The model was developed specifically for sport injury. And unlike, the other models it incorporates psychological factors that can increase the risk of injury as well as psychological responses to injury.
Like Brewer's model, the integrated model suggests that cognitive appraisal is dictated by personal and situational factors and provides a wealth of examples of each. This cognitive appraisal then impacts on the athlete's emotional and behavioural responses and recovery outcomes.
So how are these models relevant to people involved in sporting injuries or [? exercise participants? ?] They are useful in helping us to understand how and why individuals might respond in a particular way following sports injury, which might help us to identify appropriate interventions to prevent or minimise psychological difficulties. Additionally, we can look at the models and identify factors within our control that can have a positive influence on injured person's recovery such as social support.
I hope you have found this video useful. Thanks for watching.