In today’s digital age, smartphones have become an integral part of our daily lives, including in sports. While these devices offer numerous benefits, many wonder if they can also pose as a challenge to athletic performance.
Athletes nowadays are seen to spend a lot of time on their phones, which leads many to think that this potential distraction could have detrimental effects to their performance. However, if athletes can create healthy habits to use their phones for training, analysis and communication, this could really improve their performance.
But how can they do this? Self-regulation might be the answer.
In this blog, we will explore how self-regulation and phone usage can help athletes achieve their best performance. We'll uncover the keys to maintaining self-regulation in the digital age to help fuel your athletes’ athletic performance.
Self-regulation refers to an athlete's ability to manage and control their own emotions, thoughts, and behaviours. Doing so allows them to achieve specific goals or maintain optimal performance. Self-regulation is essential for athletes to develop as this enhances their performance and allows them to cope with various challenges that they may encounter.
Self-regulation strategies can involve three key components, which include:
Whilst there is a lot of research on smartphone usage within sports, this usually focuses on how athletes use social media and not other aspects of the phone.
There are many reasons athletes use their phone during training or competition – and these reasons don’t just include updating their status or live-tweeting their training session. Athletes may use their phones to supplement their self-regulation behaviours. Phones allow athletes to self-reflect on a performance. It gives them instant access to a notes page so they can write down different aspects of the performance and highlight what went well and what can be improved on. It can also allow them to improve their emotional regulation through listening to music. Putting on some headphones before a competition can help athletes calm their emotions. This in turn can reduce negative emotions such as stress or anxiety and decrease the likelihood of distraction especially before match or competition.
The self-regulation and smartphone usage model is a framework that explores the relationship between an athlete’s ability to regulate their thoughts, emotions and actions effectively and their use of smartphones. This model emphasises how self-regulation plays a crucial role in sports performance. It shows that using smartphones without self-regulation protocols in place can hinder an athlete's performance and cause constant distractions, negatively impacting concentration – and ultimately affecting athletic performance.
However, with proper self-regulation strategies in place, athletes can manage their time effectively, which enhances focus and maintains a healthy balance between digital engagement and sports performance.
Whilst this model has many factors, one of the key factors are the conditions of usage. These are the circumstances that mediate smartphone usage. There are five conditions:
Sometime, it’s hard to know how to control your athletes’ smartphone usage during sports. So, here are a few practical tips that can help you out…
Contrary to common belief, smartphone usage during sports doesn’t always harm performance. When athletes harness self-control and self-regulation while using their phones, it can actually enhance their performance and contribute to their athletic success. By finding the right balance, athletes can effectively utilise their phones as a tool to support their sports journey.