Case study Viktoria
Viktoria is a county-level wheelchair tennis player competing both as an individual and in pairs competitions. She is a strong player and is respected particularly for her accurate and powerful serve. This has allowed her to feel confident when serving. Two seasons ago she won a major event in Bath, and she is hoping to defend her title and win again at the end of next month. Her training has been going well and both her coach and strength and conditioning coach are happy with her progress. However, in recent tournaments she has started very poorly, consistently hitting the net with her first serve. She has now started to doubt her ‘go to’ powerful first serve choice and opts for a safer option, which is extremely unusual for her.
Her coach has questioned her about her serve, and in a recent meeting with her and her training and pairs partner, Adeline, she explained that she is struggling with her form, particularly on her serves. She told them that as the start of the game draws nearer, she starts to get really nervous, experiencing ‘butterflies in my stomach – and sweaty palms’, tightness through her shoulders and having doubts about her ability to perform. She explained that she is concerned about getting beaten by some of the new players to the circuit and is worried about maintaining her top 15 ranking, and what they will think of her if she loses.
Adeline tells Viktoria how, when she was having a difficult time in competition, she saw a sport psychologist, which really helped. Based on this, and with the support of her coach, Viktoria has said she is happy to accept the additional support of a sport psychologist.
Task 1 (200 words, 15 marks)
Explain the process that a sport psychologist would follow to design an appropriate intervention programme for Viktoria, highlighting the importance of professional boundaries associated with this delivery of sport psychology services.
Task 2 (500 words, 30 marks)
Drawing on appropriate theoretical content, discuss the psychological issues that may be affecting Viktoria.
Task 3 (800 words, 55 marks)
Evaluate the psychological interventions that would be most appropriate for Viktoria and which would help her to manage her emotional states. For each intervention that you choose, provide a supporting rationale.
Guidance
This TMA encourages you to apply the knowledge you acquired in Study Topic 2 to a psychological skills training intervention.
Task 1
Drawing on appropriate theoretical content, explain the process that a sport psychologist would follow to design an intervention for Viktoria. This is introduced in Study Topic 1, Unit 2 (sections 2.5 [Figure 2.3 will be particularly helpful], 2.5.1 and 2.5.2) and examples are given in Study Topic 3, Units 8 and 11.
In relation to professional boundaries, justify why it is a sport psychologist who should design and deliver the interventions associated with the delivery of sport psychology. This section will require you to draw on information from Study Topic 1, Unit 2 (section 2.3).
Task 2
Drawing on relevant theoretical content and detail from the case study, you should describe the issues that Viktoria is experiencing. To support your answer, you may like to revisit Study Topic 2 – with a focus on Units 3 and 4.
In particular, you might like to draw content from the following sections and activities:
Unit 3, including Activities 3.1 and 3.3
Unit 4, including Section 4.6 and Activities 4.2, 4.3 and 4.4.
Task 3
Using three of the four psychological strategies that have been covered in Study Topic 3 (i.e. goal setting (Unit 8), imagery (Unit 9), self-talk (Unit 10), arousal control (Unit 11)), referring to the ‘Choosing an intervention’ and ‘Planning an intervention’ stages in Keegan’s model, design an intervention programme that will help Viktoria. You should provide a rationale for the use of the strategies you choose and provide supporting evidence to justify their use.
In particular, you might like to draw content from the following sections and activities:
