Senior Lecturer M.B. Kolesnikov¹
Professor, Ph.D. V.D. Get’man¹
Professor, Dr. Hab. Yu.M. Makarov²
Associate professor, Ph.D. N.V. Lutkova²
Postgraduate student K.S. Solomenina²
¹Saint-Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, St. Petersburg
²National State University of Physical Culture, Sport and Health named after P.F. Lesgaft, St. Petersburg

Keywords: playing efficiency, method, personality factor, highly skilled player, women’s volleyball, game action, emotionally tense game situations

Introduction

It has long been a matter of common acknowledgment by the majority of sport specialists that high level of physical fitness and technical and tactical skills may not be enough to secure success in modern sport competitions unless they are supported by high personal qualities of the sport game players [1-3]. Highly skilled players in women’s volleyball are different mostly in their individual abilities to mobilize their psychological resources to the extent required by the tense game situations, and this ability may be considered among the top priority qualities of the highly skilled players. Knowing that, we designed the study to develop a personality (personal sports qualities) activation method in application to the highly skilled female volleyball players to improve their success-focused performance in the emotionally and mentally tense game situations. The study driven by the above objective was designed to solve the following issues: (1) Specify the means to help mobilize personal resources of volleyball players in the training and competitive processes; (2) Substantiate the personality factor activation method for the highly skilled female players and give the means thereby to model tense game situations with varying degrees of emotional and mental stresses.

Materials and methods

Preliminary surveys for the study were geared to collect video records of the games and the background mental/ health/ biological/ sport fitness/ education quality data, followed by opinion surveys of the volleyball coaching teams using special questionnaires. Subject to the survey were 42 coaches, each of them holding active coaching positions in professional volleyball teams including youth ones. Efficiency of the method offered by the study was substantiated and tested by the relevant educational experiments, training-and-conditioning process and in actual competitions, with 18 highly skilled players of the women’s volleyball team “Ekran” from Saint Petersburg being subjects for the tests.

Results and discussion

Our analysis of the volleyball coaches’ opinion survey data shows that virtually every one of them emphasizes the importance of personal mental qualities of the athletes that, as they say, often play a decisive role at the end of sets when the scores are even. The questioned specialists tend to believe that the physical fitness and technical/ tactical skills and qualities are normally leveled down in competitions of basically equal teams, and it is the personality factor (meaning the mental qualities of the players) that comes to the forefront in the game. The top priority personal qualities for the respondents were the following: mobilization ability (66.7%); concentration ability (55.6%); abstracting (detachment) ability (50%) and confidence in one’s own forces (44.5%); in addition, 66.7% of the coaches gave high priority to the team spirit factor. About one third (33.3%) of the specialists polled emphasize the role of luck and “fortune” as an important factor of the emotionally and mentally tense games situations; 88.3% of the coaches believe that their team players are well trained and fit enough for active game control in situations of tough opposition; 56% of the coaches confessed that they give no special time to condition personal qualities in the education and training process; and 44% of the respondents are inclined to think that the personality factor related objectives are normally attained in a natural way in the course of the technical and tactical skill improvement process.

The above questioning survey gives the grounds to conclude that coaches take no special efforts to improve the individual and team performance in the emotionally and mentally tense game situations. As demonstrated by the above responses of the coaches polled, their opinions on the subject problem are very different. However, they show good agreement saying that the special sport research and methodological literature gives little information on these problems, while the available methods and tools to address the personality factor matters are poorly developed as yet. Therefore, it may be stated with confidence that it is necessary to bridge the gap between the demand for improvement of the personality-driven inputs to the technical and tactical performance of volleyball players in the emotionally and mentally tense game situations – and the lack of necessary support from the sport science and methodology.

Having analyzed the data generated at the preliminary survey stage of the study, we obtained the means to specify the set of tools and procedures to improve the personal efficiency of the female volleyball players in the tense game situations. In this toolkit specification element, top priority will be given to the theoretical grounds for the personality factor activation tools designed to ensure highest efficiency of a player in the game situations under the study. Given on Diagram 1 hereunder are the personality factor activation vector in the education and training process in application to the 16-18 years-old female volleyball players.

The preliminary survey data were processed by statistical tools within the frame of correlation-regression analysis. The analysis specified the most meaningful personality factor elements, being as follows: result-focused motivation; self-control-based tuning; volitional control; firmness and courage in every game decision making; emotional stability and alertness; and personal contribution to the team spirit. The degree of manifestation of these important personal qualities directly depends on the personal mobilization activity of the players and is critical for the latter being flexible enough. This is the reason why the following Diagram presents the above personal qualities in the format focused on the mobilization activity development based on the relevant educational provisions purposefully created in the education-and-training process. It is the game situation with varying degrees of emotional and mental tension that will be considered a prime component for the personal mobilization skill development in the players. Game action quality control in the model situations will be the key prerequisite in the personal qualities formation process. It is the game quality criteria that will be openly applied to assess and rate every player acting in the model practices. The game quality criteria will be summarized to rate the players and assign them certain roles or positions in the team. This rating model gives the means to the coach to have clear understanding of the expectable game contribution of every team player in different game situations. The personal qualities rating approach provides a reasonably grounded basis for the coach to know the individual game-control abilities of the players in the emotionally tense game situations rather than being governed by the coaching intuition only.

Diagram 1. General vector of the personality factor activation process in the education and training system applied to 16-18 years-old female volleyball players

Furthermore, we outlined hereunder the general vector of the personal qualities mobilization process when putting together the theoretical grounds for the personality factor activation method in application to the 16-18 years-old female volleyball players (Table 1).

Table 1. Personality factor activation method in application to 16-18 years-old female volleyball players

The methodology based on the emotionally tense game situation modeling will be designed on the following frame conditions:

– Practices will be formed on an integrated basis so as to address the technical and tactical skills, special physical fitness conditioning and personal qualities mobilization challenges at the same time;

– Tense game situations with varying degrees of emotional and mental stresses will be addressed by the model;

– Model practices will be performed on a competitive basis;

– The degrees of emotional and mental tension will be increased in a phased manner in the practices;

– The player will be trained to face variable game situations and make her own independent and reasonable decisions in every game situation;

– Practice intensity will be regulated by the coach; and

– Every player’s error will be fixed and assessed by the relevant game quality criteria that provide a basis for the players rating list.

The methodology offered herein is based on the purposefully developed standard game situations that model tense game environments with varying degrees of emotional and mental tension. The tension will be created and stepped up by distracting factors introduced in the game situations to effectively complicate the technical and tactical performance of the players. The emotional and mental discomfort of the game situations will be further burdened by the practice duration and intensity related factors. The psychological focus on the positive result of every game action fostered in the players, with the game action quality being subject for assessment followed by open rating of the players (based on their success rates in the specific game situation(s) or in the training session on the whole) will give the means to create the highly competitive and demanding training environment thereby forming the necessary personal qualities in the players.

Based on the above frame conditions, we developed the content of the integrated practices that assume four degrees of the emotional and mental tension in the game situations to be faced by the players. In the initial training stage, the model game situations will be designed for the following tension buildup sequence: low, mean, high and extreme tension. Every education and training session will include 2-3 game practices. The number of practices will be varied as dictated by the training stage and goals of the specific training session. In the process of the present method implementation in the 16-18 years-old female volleyball players’ training and education process, every effort will be taken to prevent them from getting accustomed to the practices. With this purpose in mind, both the practice content will be persistently varied and the emotional and mental backgrounds of the game situations will be changed.

Content of the training and education practices was designed with consideration for the upcoming competitions and the skill levels of the opponents and included the following obligatory components: (1) theoretical component; (2) game-role-driven individual practices; and (3) model game situations addressed by the relevant team and individual practices. The theoretical component was designed to spell out the performance-focused mental setting. The second component focused attention on requirements to the game-role-driven practices. And the third component was designed to eliminate unforced errors from the individual and team practices.

Conclusion

Practical implementation of the method and conditions offered herein in the education and training process has helped notably improve the technical and tactical performance efficiency of the 16-18 years-old female volleyball players in competitions and thereby step up their sport accomplishments.

References

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2. Voleybol: uchebnik dlya vuzov (Volleyball: Textbook for universities) / Ed. by A.V. Belyaev, M.V. Savin. 4th ed. - Moscow: TVT Divizion, 2009. – 360 P.
3. Makarov Yu.M. Igrovaya deyatel’nost’ v sportivnykh igrah. Poznanie. Sistemnost’. Razvitie: monografiya (Play activities in team games. Cognition. Systemacy. Development: Monograph) / Yu.M. Makarov. – St. Petersburg: Lema, 2013. – 237 P.

Corresponding author: nataliya_lutkova@mail.ru