A Study on Pre-and Post-Competition State Anxiety among the Athletes

Abstract

This study investigates and evaluates before and after competitive anxiety, self-confidence, and performance of the athletes. The Cognitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 was administered to collect data from 73 athletes, both men and women, before and after the competition. The paired t-test was used to find the significant difference between the pre and post competition. Results showed that the levels of cognitive condition of anxiety before the competition were low as compared after the competition and the levels of somatic state anxiety before the competition was high as compared after the competition, whereas the levels of self-confidence before the competition were high as compared after the competition. This study concludes that the levels of cognitive state anxiety increase after the competition as athletes could not perform according to the performance expectations; on the contrary, the levels of somatic anxiety decrease as there was no pressure of performance on the athletes after the competition and the levels of self-confidence decrease after the competition as athletes could not reach their desired performance levels.