Self representations and music performance anxiety: A study with professional and amateur musicians

Abstract

Individual, social and situational factors might play an important role on the experience of anxiety during musical performances. The present research focused on the relationship between self-representations, including musical self, and performance anxiety among a sample of Italian professional and amateur musicians (N = 100; age, M = 23.40, 50% females). We predicted that higher self-discrepancies (actual vs. future self) would be associated with higher performance anxiety in a musical setting (vs. a non musical one), via musical self, and only in professional musicians. The results confirmed our hypothesis. Higher discrepancies between actual and future self-representations were positively associated with higher performance anxiety levels via the musical self only in participants who play instruments at a professional level. Furthermore, musical self influenced performance anxiety levels in a music related setting (i.e., a concert) but not in a non musical one (i.e., an exam).

Conservatory Students’ Music Performance Anxiety and Educational Expectations: A Qualitative Study

“…Similar to Yondem (2007) and Teztel and Aşkın (2007), this study found that students had anxiety of being evaluated, the anxiety of being acclaimed, and stage anxiety. In other words, anxiety has both positive and negative effects on music performance, and it can contribute positively to performance to some degree (Alptekin, 2012;Castiglione, Rampullo, & Cardullo, 2018). When it came to being evaluated and acclaimed, this study's participants perceived MPA particularly negatively.…”

Kenny Music Performance Anxiety Inventory: Contribution for the Portuguese Validation

“…Studies also showed the central role of social and situational variables on MPA, suggesting significantly higher anxiety levels when the performance has an audience, highlighting concerns such as fear of being negatively judged, the size and status of the audience, and the competitive nature of the performance [11,12,18].…”

“…The results of some of these studies indicate a predisposition of women to feel higher levels of dysfunctional anxiety in the contexts of musical performance [16,17]. Extrinsic motivation (e.g., meeting parental expectations) [18] and personality characteristics (e.g., higher levels of trait anxiety or high perfectionism) [19] are also predictors of performance anxiety.…”

“…The results of some of these studies indicate a predisposition of women to feel higher levels of dysfunctional anxiety in the contexts of musical performance [ 16 , 17 ]. Extrinsic motivation (e.g., meeting parental expectations) [ 18 ] and personality characteristics (e.g., higher levels of trait anxiety or high perfectionism) [ 19 ] are also predictors of performance anxiety. Studies also showed the central role of social and situational variables on MPA, suggesting significantly higher anxiety levels when the performance has an audience, highlighting concerns such as fear of being negatively judged, the size and status of the audience, and the competitive nature of the performance [ 11 , 12 , 18 ].…”

The Pedagogical Encouragement of Self-Regulation Applying PMM during the Activities

“…Leon-Guerrero (2008) analysed the capabilities of self-regulation and states that examination of the concurrent verbal report and music practice data revealed that repetition was referred to or used more frequently than other strategies. Individual, social and situational factors might play an important role on the experience of anxiety during musical performances (Castiglione, Rampullo, Cardullo, 2018). In Marijan (2017) opinion, self-regulation is formed through interaction with the environment, thus self-learning, self-analysis, self-judgment, self-instruction, and self-monitoring are the main functions in self-regulatory structure.…”