Measurement of Multidimensional Sport Performance Anxiety in Children and Adults: The Sport Anxiety Scale-2

Abstract

This article describes the development and validation of the Sport Anxiety Scale-2 (SAS-2), a multidimensional measure of cognitive and somatic trait anxiety in sport performance settings. Scale development was stimulated by findings that the 3-factor structure of the original Sport Anxiety Scale (SAS; Smith, Smoll, & Schutz, 1990) could not be reproduced in child samples and that several items on the scale produced conflicting factor loadings in adult samples. Alternative items having readability levels of grade 4 or below were therefore written to create a new version suitable for both children and adults. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses replicated the original SAS factor structure at all age levels, yielding separate 5-item subscales for Somatic Anxiety, Worry, and Concentration Disruption in samples as young as 9 to 10 years of age. The SAS-2 has stronger factorial validity than the original scale did, and construct validity research indicates that scores relate to other psychological measures as expected. The scale reliably predicts precompetition state anxiety scores and proved sensitive to anxiety-reduction interventions directed at youth sport coaches and parents.

Associations between competitive anxiety, athlete characteristics and sport context: evidence from a systematic review and meta-analysis

“…The weaknesses found are related to the lack of presentation of raw data, measures used to avoid potential bias sources and sample size calculation. Another negative point to be considered, despite the sound literature on the two-dimensionality of this psychological phenomenon 3,10,11 , is the use of one-dimensional measurements of CA (SCAT) and others for measuring the general/global anxiety (STAI and BAI), suggesting that there may be an influence of other anxiety symptoms/characteristics other than competitive. This fact reinforces the importance of using specific anxiety scales in the sports context considering the multidimensionality of this phenomenon.…”

“…CA was initially understood one-dimensionally, but this approach was surpassed with the introduction of the Multidimensional Theory of Anxiety, which proposes the existence of somatic (SCA) and cognitive (CCA) dimensions correlating to each other positively despite being different 3,10,11 .…”

Effects of Official Basketball Competition on the Levels of Cortisol and Salivary Immunoglobulin (A) among female children

“…Competition anxiety was measured by self-reported using the Sport Anxiety Scale 2 (SAS-2), that is a multidimensional measurement of somatic and cognitive trait anxiety for children in sport performance [25]. Subjects were asked to fill the SAS-2 twice In order to make an ensure consistency in the responses, once 48h before the competition at control days and on the day prior to competition.…”

Psychometric Properties of the Spanish Version of the Flow State Scale

“…A large amount of investigations and studies developed over the last few years in psychology focus on discovering and analyzing the variables that may impair performance and satisfaction when carrying out an activity, in an attempt to determine negative experiences during performance (Craft, Magyar, Becker, & Feltz, 2003;Smith, Smoll, Cumming, & Grossbard, 2006). However, few works have attempted to determine which cognitive processes may contribute to improving performance, satisfaction, and wellbeing through optimal subjective experiences.…”