DISCRIMINANT EFFECTIVENESS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STATE MEASURES IN PREDICTING PERFORMANCE OUTCOME IN KARATE COMPETITION

Male Shotokan karate players (karateka) (N = 208) completed the Compet itive Stare Anxiety Inventory-2 and the Profile of Mood Stales about 4 0 minutes before a competition. Single-factor multivariate analysis of variance of preperformance mood and anxiety scores indicated signific ant differences between winning and losing competitors. Winners scored higher on Vigor, Anger and Self-confidence, and lower on Tension, Dep ression, Fatigue, Confusion, Cognitive Anxiety, and Somatic Anxiety. D iscriminant function analysis showed that 91.96% of participants could be correctly classified as winners or losers on the basis of preperfo rmance mood scores. This figure rose to 93.47% when scores on the anxi ety subscales were also included in the discriminant function analysis . Anxiety scores alone produced 78.89% discrimination. Mood profiles f or winning karateka were in line with the ''mental health'' profile of Morgan except for above-average scores on Anger. This result supports the view of McGowan and Miller that anger may facilitate performance in karate competition. The capacity of measures of psychological state to discriminate performance exceeds previous reports, suggesting that karate performance may be exceptionally mood-dependent. These results suggest that interventions which increase scores on Vigor and Anger a nd reduce scores on Tension, Depression, Fatigue, and Confusion may be particularly efficacious for Shotokan karate performance.