Abstract

This study was conducted to examine the effects of state anxiety and its subcomponents, worry and emotionality, on the performance of a motor task, consisting of throwing tennis balls overhand at a target. Sixty male physical education students participated in the experiment. Anxiety was manipulated by selecting low, moderate, and high trait anxiety subjects and by giving specific task instructions. No relation between any of the three anxiety measures and the accuracy in terms of scores indicating the place of hitting the target could be demonstrated. However, if the target was to be hit at a moment specified by the position of a small moving flag coinciding with the position of the bulls eye, moderate state anxiety subjects and moderate cognitive anxiety subjects showed better timing performance than the low and the high anxious subjects. Timing performance was independent of the level of emotionality. Comparison of the performances of the 12 subjects rated highest, and the 12 subjects rated lowest on ball game proficiency (these ratings being based on teachers judgements), indicated that these groups only differed with respect to the timing aspect of throwing, the former group timing their throws significantly better than the latter one. This result was taken as evidence for the contention that only the timing aspect of throwing could be qualified as being difficult, which was in concordance with the finding that only with respect to this aspect, effects of anxiety could be demonstrated. Verf.-Referat (gekuerzt)