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Researches On The Factors Influencing Performance Of Military Pentathlon And Mental Training Skills

Posted on:2006-05-05Degree:DoctorType:Dissertation
Country:ChinaCandidate:Y B LiFull Text:PDF
GTID:1117360152496154Subject:Aerospace and maritime medicine
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
Military pentathlon is a kind of international military competition organized by the International Military Sports Council (CISM). Military pentathlon is a polyathletic sport competition consisting of 5 parts, orderly shooting with standard rifle, obstacle-run, obstacle-swimming, throwing of standard projectiles and cross-country. The sport competition is organized exclusively for the servicemen. Because the 5 parts are elicited from military physical training, military pentathlon is more difficult than other competitions. So being elite, athletes should possess both good psychological and physiological qualities. Although our military pentathlon teams stand on the top level of the world, there are very little literatures on the competition. Discovering principles of military pentathlon can keep and develop athletes' performance and provide some advice for the common training of our military forcesThe main objectives of this study were to find out the psychological factors influencing performance of military pentathlon and examine the effects of mental training. This study aimed at four points. The first aim was to identify the personality profile of military pentathlon athletes. The second purpose was to make clear the performance structure and find its sticking point through analyzing the performance of international championships during the past 7 years by some statistical methods such as factor analysis. The third target was to provide a conceptual structure about the factors influencing performance by means of structured interview with four coaches and 12 athletes who had taken part in international military pentathlon championship. The fourth and final goal was to examine how well mental training package-enhanced performance practically by employing asingle-subject multiple baseline design. Furthermore, there was significant difference in the personality traits of warmth, liveliness and self-reliance among the three grades of athletes. Main results and conclusions:1. Because military pentathlon is a unique athletic event with a distinctive social and psychological climate that might be reflected in the personalities of the participants in many ways. Military pentathlon athletes are warmer, more dominant, livelier, bolder, and tenser, less vigilant, less apprehensive, and less self-reliant than those in normative groups. Moreover, there was significant difference among personalities of athletes, air traffic controllers and soldiers of anti-disturbance electronically.2. The exploratory factor analysis of the performance in the international championships showed that military pentathlon could be divided three principal components: skill component, endurance component and agility component. However, model 4 appeared to be the best choice by confirmatory factor analysis, which confirmed that military pentathlon could be divided four principal components: skill component (shooting and precision throwing), endurance component (obstacle-run and cross-country), velocity component (obstacle-swimming) and strength component (distance throwing). Compared with the excellent athletes, most athletes' performance of shooting and throwing (skill component) fluctuated, which attributes to psychological causes. Therefore, to keep predominance on military pentathlon, athletes should improve psychological qualities by mental training and enhance physical qualities by new scientific training methods.3. By structured interview, major factors perceived to have influence on performance included psychological factors (psychological qualities, emotional experiences, mental skills, intelligence, morality and mentality to compete), physical factors (training, physical qualities, injury, sporting genius and age), social factors (coaches, other individuals and social expectation), environmental factors (field, climate, rest, food and time difference), and integrated factors (plans before competition, competition experience and luck).4. The mental skills package including progressive relaxation, biofeedback, imagery and goal setting was effective in enhancing military pentathlon shooting performance in practice for all four participants. The...
Keywords/Search Tags:military pentathlon, personality, structured interview, qualitative analysis, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, shooting, mental skill
PDF Full Text Request
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