The Manchester
Metropolitan University
MMU Cheshire
Pre-entry Material 2015
BSc (Hons) Psychology of Sport and Exercise
BSc (Hons) Psychology of Sport and Exercise (PSE)
Dear Student,
Congratulations on being accepted for the BSc (Hons)
Psychology of Sport and Exercise (normally abbreviated to
PSE) here at MMU Cheshire. This is an exciting course,
combining your love of sport or exercise with a curiosity of how
psychology can explain how and why we behave the way we do.
Some of the questions that the course will examine include:
1. What motivates someone to push themselves to the limit in their chosen sport?
2. How can we devise programmes to help someone who has had a heart attack, start and
continue exercising?
3. Why do some athletes take performance enhancing compounds (even when they know they
shouldn’t)?
4. How can we help disabled and injured athletes achieve their goals?
5. Can you get addicted to exercise?
6. What role does a sport or exercise psychologist have in a multidisciplinary team?
The course provides you with a chance to explore how we study human behaviour in various contexts
including:

In team games (leadership and group cohesion)

In elite performance (motivation, imagery)

In high risk situations (anxiety and arousal)

In clinical situations (mental health and illness; motivation, locus of control)

You will also study traditional psychology so you can apply general principles to sport and
exercise.
Successful completion of the BSc (Hons) Psychology of Sport and Exercise programme will provide you
with a degree conferring Graduate Basis for Chartered Membership with the British Psychological
Society (BPS). This is the first step towards becoming a Chartered Psychologist.
What occupations and professions would this degree be useful for?
Many graduates of this programme continue with post-graduate studies to train as a sport or exercise
psychologist. Other opportunities exist in the field of sport, health and leisure, where the knowledge and
skills you will have gained will be a valuable asset.
The Pathway through the Course
In your first year, you will be introduced to psychological theory and application in a fun and interactive
unit called Psychology and You. In another unit, Psychology in Practice, we explore the work of
different types of Chartered Psychologists. We look at how they undertake research in their area and
use evidence-based interventions. Guest lecturers will tell you the reality of working as a Chartered
Psychologist, for example, in Sport and Exercise. In this unit, you will also learn how to carry out
research and analyse both quantitative and qualitative data. In Physiology One, you will have the
opportunity to carry out physiological studies in the state-of-the-art physiology lab in the Department of
Exercise and Sport Science. Finally, Psychology One explores how psychological principles are applied
in a sport and exercise context.
Over the three years of your degree, your studies will help you to gradually become an independent
learner, enabling you to focus on the issues that you find interesting or you wish to explore as possible
areas for a career. You will also have the opportunity to take short courses and voluntary internships to
enhance your job prospects both during and after your studies.
But first things first! As a new undergraduate, we just want you to settle into your course, begin to
engage with your studies and enjoy learning more about Psychology of Sport and Exercise.
Preparation for BSc (Hons) Psychology of Sport and Exercise (PSE)
The enclosed sheet provides you with details of the work you need to do to get started.
Please don’t worry about the pre-entry activity task; it is meant to stimulate your interest
and help you to get off to a flying start in September!
I have also enclosed a reading list of books you might use in your first year. Please don’t rush out and
buy them from new– check Amazon and e-bay first and don’t forget current students often sell their
books at the beginning of the new academic year. We stock all these books in the library, but you might
want to buy one or two books that will be useful throughout your studies (I have marked these with an
asterisk *).
Finally, check out the University website for details on how to join the PSE student facebook and how to
pre-order your PSE sports kit for Physiology One lab classes.
We look forward to welcoming you in September, but if you have any questions before then, please feel
free to contact me.
With my best wishes,
Dr Maria Livanou
Senior Lecturer
Programme Leader PSE &
Subject Leader Psychology
Email: m.livanou@mmu.ac.uk
Room 1-31 Wilson Building, Crewe Campus
Pre-entry activity
This pre-entry activity is designed to help you to prepare for your first year as an
undergraduate with us. On the next page, you will find an article from The
Telegraph (you can also access it electronically at
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/active/10568898/Sportsvisualisation-how-to-imagine-your-way-to-success.html). Please read it
and think of what are the main points that the article makes. The questions you
may want to consider is “What is visualization and how does it help in sports?”
and “What other factors may influence a person’s performance in sports?”
*********
Sports visualisation: how to imagine your way to success
Why do Wayne Rooney, Jonny Wilkinson and Andy Murray use visualisation before
competition? And could it help you too?
Mark Bailey explores the powers of the imagination
(Written by Mark Bailey, The Telegraph, Thursday 04/06/2015)
On the evening before a Premier League football match, Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney
habitually asks the club’s kit man what colour shirts, shorts and socks the team will wear the next day.
It’s not that Rooney is a closet fashionista eager to match the colour of his boots, underpants or hair
transplants to the shades of his team’s battle garb. Rooney’s mind craves forensic details before a
game for one special purpose: to enhance the accuracy of his psychological preparation.
“I lie in bed the night before the game and visualise myself scoring goals or doing well,” he once
revealed. “You're trying to put yourself in that moment and trying to prepare yourself, to have a
'memory' before the game.” Knowing exactly which kit he will be wearing helps him conjure up a
richer, more detailed and authentic vision. “I don't know if you'd call it visualising or dreaming, but
I've always done it, my whole life.”
For Rooney, this use of imagery – the act of creating and ‘rehearsing’ a positive mental experience in
order to enhance your ability to achieve a successful outcome in real life – is an instinctive method
honed since childhood, and one shared by great athletes from Muhammad Ali and Michael Phelps to
Jessica Ennis-Hill and Jonny Wilkinson. Prior to London 2012, Ennis-Hill revealed: “I use
visualisation to think about the perfect technique. If I can get that perfect image in my head, then
hopefully it’ll affect my physical performance.”
Wilkinson regularly performs visualisation sessions before games. “You are creating the sights and
sounds and smells, the atmosphere, the sensation, and the nerves, right down to the early morning
wake-up call and that feeling in your stomach. It helps your body to get used to performing under
pressure.”
Once the game begins and Wilkinson is required to kick for goal, he uses a visualisation routine to
help him put the ball between the posts: “I visualise the ball travelling along that path and imagine the
sensation of how the ball is going to feel when it hits my foot for the perfect strike.”
It’s clear that visualisation is no longer just an abstract concept associated with hippies, dreamers and
people who own crystal skulls, but a quantifiable component of modern sports psychology. We can be
fairly certain that Wayne Rooney isn’t burning joss-sticks and meditating on a yoga mat with his
ankles wrapped around his neck, but it is intriguing to know that his quest for precise detail could be
what makes him so special.
“The most important thing with imagery is using multiple senses, like sound, sight and smell,”
explains sports psychologist Dr Steve Bull, author of The Game Plan. “What makes (a player like)
Rooney unique is his imagination. When he visualises scoring a goal, he can feel his foot hitting the
ball, the smell of the grass under his foot and the sound of the crowd. This incredibly vivid imagery
helps an athlete to prepare mentally, by improving their confidence, focus, clarity and speed of
thought. It helps them prepare for any scenario: how will I react to the crowd? What if we go 1-0
down? What shot will I take in a certain situation? But it also fires impulses to the muscles, therefore
priming them for action. The more vivid the mental image, the more effectively your brain primes
your muscles to complete the same physical and technical action in a real game.”
Can this really be the case? Science certainly suggests so. Sports psychologist Dr Richard Suinn
found that visual rehearsal actually triggers neural firings in the muscles and creates a mental
blueprint that can ultimately facilitate future performance. Using electromyographic equipment, Suinn
discovered that skiers who simply visualised skiing downhill fired electrical impulses and produced
muscle patterns almost identical to those found when the skiers actually hit the slopes. Of course, no
amount of visualisation can make up for years of physical practise – we’re not in the realm of X-Men
just yet. But it seems mental rehearsal can indeed help an athlete to fire up their muscles for optimal
performance.
Adding to Suinn’s remarkable studies, researchers at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation in Ohio found
that subjects who only visualised doing biceps curls, five times a week, for two weeks, increased their
strength by 13.5pc. Naturally, if they had lifted weights the gains would have been infinitely greater.
You can’t sit at home on the sofa eating M&Ms and just thinking your way to a body like Chris
Hemsworth. But the science suggests you can use your mind to at least prime your muscles for growth
and performance.
Visualisation is proving to be an understandably popular mechanism with elite athletes eager for
marginal gains. The use of imagery primes their muscles to perform correct technique and to execute
appropriate actions in competition, but it also conditions their mind to think clearly about how they
will react to certain pressures, situations and problems. Consider it a ‘mental warm-up.’
This method is used regularly by many of the world’s best tennis players who are currently competing
at the Australian Open. Defending champion Novak Djokovic and 2013 Wimbledon champion Andy
Murray both use imagery to prepare for games. Djokovic was taught to visualise his shots to the
accompaniment of classical music by his first coach. Murray has even been known to make several
visits to a deserted Centre Court in advance of Wimbledon in order to mentally acclimatise to the
environment. “I have sat on Centre Court with no one there and thought a bit about the court, the
matches I have played there,” Murray said. “I want to make sure I feel as good as possible so I have a
good tournament.”
It’s not hard to see how these methods from the elite world of sport can be appropriated or adapted for
the rest of us. Visualisation can be used to help an amateur athlete prepare for a big game, a marathon,
or a bike race by encouraging them to focus on the execution of correct skills and good technique. But
it can also help mentally, by encouraging an athlete to prepare strategies for different scenarios, such
as start-line nerves, punctures, and penalty placings.
Neither is it limited to sport. Visualisation can galvanise somebody preparing for an important
boardroom meeting or a client dinner, too. “There is a huge crossover between the demands of sport
and business,” concludes Bull. “For example, if you visualise a big business presentation in real
detail, you will prepare for everything from your best posture and body language, and how you will
handle any feelings of anxiety, to the awkward questions that might be asked and how you will
respond to them. By the time you walk in there, you will feel much more confident.”
In business, as in sport, the more vivid your imagination, the better the results will be.
Reading List
Most of the following books are part of the first year core unit reading lists. You may also
find it useful to read some general psychology texts that introduce you to the discipline.
Bekerian, D.A. & Levey, A.B.
(2005)
Applied Psychology: putting theory Gosport: Oxford
into practice
University Press
Beins, A., & Beins, B.
(2008)
Effective writing in Psychology.
Papers, Posters & Presentations *
Oxford:
Blackwell
Berryman, J., Ockleford, E.,
Howells, K., Hargreaves, D. &
Wildbur, D. (2006)
Psychology and You: An Informal
Introduction (3rd Edition)
Oxford: BPS
Blackwell
Brace, N., Kemp, R., Snelgar,
R. (2012).
SPSS for psychologists (5th
Edition)
New York:
Palgrave
Macmillan
Breakwell, M. Hammond, S.
Fife-Shaw, C. (2006)
Research Methods in Psychology
(3rd Edition) *
London, CA:
Sage
Carron, A.V. and
Hausenblas, H.A.
Mark A.E (2005)
Group Dynamics in Sport (3rd Edition)
Morgantown
WV; Fitness
Information
Technology
Burr, V. (2002)
The Person in Social Psychology
Hove: Taylor &
Francis
McArdle, W.D.
Katch, F.I. and
Katch, V.L. (2000)
Essentials of Exercise Physiology.
(Second Edition)
Philadelphia:
Lippincott,
Williams and
Wilkins.
McArdle, W.D.
Katch, F.I. and
Katch V.L. (2001)
Exercise Physiology. Energy, Nutrition,
and Physical Performance (5th Edition)
Philadelphia:
Lippincott,
Williams and
Wilkins.
Schmidt, R.A. (2005)
Motor Learning and Performance:
From Principles to Practice (4th
Edition)
Champaign, IL;
Human Kinetics
Weinberg, R.S.
and Gould, D. (2007)
Foundations of Sport and Exercise
Psychology (4th Edition) *
Leeds: Human
Kinetics