Why some people choke under pressure revealed
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A new study has tried to
shed light on why some people choke under pressure and
fail to achieve something. Researchers suggested that in situations like
this, performance depends on two factors -the framing of the incentive
in terms of a loss or a gain, and a person's aversion to loss. The study
found that those with high loss aversion choked when told they stood to
gain a lot, while those with low loss aversion choked under the
pressure of large prospective losses. By monitoring the participants'
brain activity as they were presented with incentives and then performed
a skilled movement task, the researchers found that performance is
influenced by a brain area called the ventral striatum. Researcher
Vikram Chib said that they can measure someone's loss aversion and then
frame the task in a way that might help them avoid choking under
pressure. The researchers found that an incentive -as a potential gain
or loss -had a profound effect on person's behavior while performing a
skilled task and the effect of pressure was different for those with
high versus low aversion to loss, as high loss aversion seemed to help
players' performance when they were threatened with increasing losses.
Chib believes that these results confirm that the ventral striatum is
the interface between incentive-driven motivation and execution of
physical performance, and he hopes these insights could help coaches and
others to work with -or overcome -people's loss aversion in order to
maximise their performance.More importantly than playing sports, the
insights could help people taking important tests, pilots flying under
dangerous conditions or surgeons performing difficult procedures.
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