The purpose of this study was to examine self-efficacy and self-esteem as predictors of claimed and behavioral self-handicapping, and to compare the relationship between behavioral and claimed self-handicaps and athletic performance. A total of 31 basketball players participated in the study. Claimed self-handicaps were significantly negatively correlated with selfesteem whereas behavioral self-handicapping was significantly negatively correlated with self-efficacy. Performance was negatively correlated with behavioral self-handicapping, but was not correlated with claimed self-handicapping. These findings reinforce the conceptual distinction between claimed and behavioral self-handicaps by demonstrating that the two strategies are indeed related to different factors and that they have different consequences for performance.

The thermal discomfort caused by a hot or hot-wet climate can have negative effects on human performance. The 2020 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games will take place in Tokyo’s hot and humid summer period, possibly exposing athletes to severe environmental stressors. In addition to technical, tactical, physical and nutritional preparation, Olympians and Paralympians need an optimal psychological state to turn in their best performances, especially in terms of emotional control, concentration and motivation. Yet, the tropical climate can have many negative effects on these factors. Better understanding of the negative effects of this climate and the strategies to manage them might be crucial for competitors, coaches and their teams in Japan. At the psychological level, cooling interventions before, during and/or immediately after exercise were mainly studied on perceptual responses. However, the effects of these interventions on other psychological components such as cognitive abilities or psychological states and the use of psychological techniques have been little explored, especially in hot-wet climate. Thus, this article proposes to take stock of the knowledge on the conventional and alternative strategies that help athletes to psychologically cope with the subtropical climate of Tokyo.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the mediational role of self-confidence and anxiety in the relationship between self-esteem and claimed self-handicapping in an achievement context. After hearing and reading about specific conditions of performing that were intended to favor invoking excuses for future poor performance, 68 competitive basketball players completed measures of self-esteem, anxiety (cognitive and somatic), self-confidence, and claimed self-handicapping. Then, they warmed-up and carried out a basketball task. Self-esteem negatively predicted cognitive anxiety and positively predicted self-confidence. In turn, selfconfidence negatively predicted claimed self-handicapping and mediated the relationship between self-esteem and claimed self-handicapping. Cognitive and somatic anxieties did not mediate the relationship between self-esteem and claimed self-handicapping. Together, these results suggest that individuals with low self-esteem use more claimed self-handicaps because they have lower self-confidence. These findings shed light on the psychological processes that lead people with low self-esteem to use strategies of claimed self-handicaps.

Cette étude expérimentale porte sur les effets d’une routine de préparation au service composée principalement d’imagerie mentale (IM) selon une modalité visuelle externe centrée sur la trajectoire de la balle et la zone cible à atteindre. Quarante joueurs experts étaient aléatoirement séparés en deux groupes expérimentaux : contrôle et imagerie. Ils ont réalisé un pré-test (i.e., 25 premières balles de service en condition de match), 20 séances d’acquisition (i.e., pratique physique + IM ou pratique physique seule) et un post-test similaire au pré-test, en condition écologique. Le pourcentage des premières balles de service, la vitesse de ces dernières et un score d’efficacité de celles-ci, évalué par des experts observant les retours de services en condition de match, servaient d’indicateurs de performance et de variables dépendantes. Les résultats de cette expérience montrent notamment une amélioration du pourcentage de première balle chez les participants du groupe imagerie uniquement. Il semble donc bénéfique pour des joueurs de tennis experts d’avoir recours à des routines basées sur la respiration, le rebond de balle et l’imagerie mentale de la trajectoire de la balle et de la cible à atteindre avant de servir des premières balles en condition de match.

This study examined how a tropical climate (i.e., hot and wet climatic environment) and different language instructions, in French and in Creole, could affect imagery ability on French-Creole bilingual in the French West Indies. Participants were divided into two groups: Half of them completed the French Movement Imagery Questionnaire (MIQ-F), the others realized the Creole version (MIQ-C), in Neutral Climate (NC) then in Tropical Climate (TC). The results of this original study showed that participants had lower visual and kinaesthetic MIQ-F and kinaesthetic MIQ-C imagery scores, but had higher visual MIQ-C imagery scores, in TC than in NC. Poor imagers had significant lower kinaesthetic MIQ-F, and better visual MIQ-C imagery scores in TC than in NC. The results of this study suggested that imagery language instruction can modulate the influence of tropical climate on imagery ability. The difference between Creole and French language effects on cognition as imagery is discussed.