Effect of Pre- and Post-Competitive State Anxiety among the Athletes

Abstract

This study explore investigates and evaluates pre- and post-competitive anxiety, self-confidence, and performance of the athletes. The Cognitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 was administered to collect data from 100 athletes, both men and women, before and after the competition, who participated in annual sports tournament of Subharti University Meerut. The paired t-test was used to find the significant difference between the pre- and post-competition. Results showed that the levels of cognitive state anxiety before the competition were low as compared after the competition and the levels of somatic state anxiety before the competition were 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.