Investigating the Protective Role of Mastery Imagery Ability in Buffering Debilitative Stress Responses

Abstract

Mastery imagery has been shown to be associated with more positive cognitive and emotional responses to stress, but research is yet to investigate the influence of mastery imagery ability on imagery’s effectiveness in regulating responses to acute stress, such as competition. Furthermore, little research has examined imagery’s effectiveness in response to actual competition. This study examined (a) whether mastery imagery ability was associated with stress response changes to a competitive stress task, a car racing computer game, following an imagery intervention, and (b) the effects of different guided imagery content on pre-task cognitive and emotional responses. In Session 1, 78 participants ( M age = 20.03 years, SD = 1.28) completed ratings of pre-task anxiety intensity and direction, confidence, and perceived control. Imagery ability was also assessed before completing the task. In Session 2, participants were randomly allocated to an imagery condition (positive mastery, negative mastery, relaxation) or control group (no imagery) before completing the task and outcome measures again. For the negative mastery group, greater positive mastery imagery ability was associated with greater perceived control and perceiving anxiety as more facilitative. Furthermore, mastery imagery ability moderated the relationship between anxiety intensity and direction. Altogether, results suggest that positive mastery imagery ability may act as a potential buffer against the effects of negative images.

Penalty success in professional soccer: a randomised comparison between imagery methodologies

“…The person-centred FIT for groups approach directly explores specific and general motivational goals (Paivio, 1985) discussed through mutual collaboration with the psychologist and team-mates. These discussions emphasise the importance of selfregulated deliberate practice and emotional control connected with long-term goals, resulting in positive self-imagery which can impact performance (Quinton, Veldhuijzen van Zanten, Trotman, Cumming, & Williams, 2019).…”

Mastery Imagery Ability Is Associated With Positive Anxiety and Performance During Psychological Stress

“…Research examining the explicit use of mastery imagery content during stressful situations (rather than the general ability to image mastery-based content), demonstrates that mastery imagery use tends to have a greater impact on anxiety interpretation than the intensity (Williams et al, 2010 ; Williams and Cumming, 2012a , Williams et al, 2017 ). Furthermore, preliminary results have suggested that increasing mastery imagery ability through an imagery training intervention may be effective in altering anxiety interpretation rather than intensity in relation to psychological stress (Möller, 2018 ). Collectively, this body of work suggests that mastery imagery ability may be important for anxiety intensity at a general level, but more important for anxiety interpretation when the anxiety is in response to a specific stressful situation, event, or task.…”

“…Despite the rigorous approach employed, the cross-sectional nature of the work prevents any conclusions of causal relationships existing between variables (Christenfeld et al, 2004 ). Although there is some preliminary data suggesting that improving mastery imagery ability may lead to more positive perceptions of anxiety (Möller, 2018 ), it is important that future research comprehensively examines the effects of increasing mastery imagery ability on anxiety responses and performance during stress. Due to the healthy population in the present study, future research should also examine the hypothesized model in clinical populations (e.g., those with a clinical diagnosis of anxiety) to determine whether the relationship between confidence, mastery imagery ability, anxiety intensity, anxiety interpretation, and performance is similar to that of a non-clinical population.…”

“…More recent research has examined the ability to image content associated with emotions and cognitions, specifically, its correlates and the impact such an ability can have on using this type of imagery content to regulate arousal and anxiety. Findings demonstrated that mastery imagery ability is an important correlate of confidence and anxiety, and appears to influence the impact of stress evoking imagery scripts (Quinton et al, 2019 ). Mastery imagery ability is positively associated with greater trait confidence (Williams and Cumming, 2012b , 2015 ; Quinton et al, 2018 ).…”

Effects of arousal reappraisal on the anxiety responses to stress: Breaking the cycle of negative arousal intensity and arousal interpretation

“…Responses are made on a 7‐point Likert‐type scale ranging from −3 (very debilitative/negative) to +3 (very facilitative/positive) . The IAMS provides definitions to ensure individuals fully understand the meaning of each construct and has been identified as a valid and reliable measure to assess state anxiety (Thomas et al., 2002) and is frequently used to assess state anxiety in laboratory‐based stress studies (Moore, Vine, Wilson, & Freeman, 2012; Quinton, Veldhuijzen van Zanten, Trotman, Cumming, & Williams, 2019; Trotman et al., 2018).…”