How Injuries Affect the Self-Esteem of Athletes
This project will introduce preliminary research on the psychological effect of physical injury on athletes’ self-esteem. An individual’s athletic and academic performance is affected by one’s self-esteem. When discussing athletes, an injury may be the single most feared and problematic event among athletes. Training and preparation done by an athlete is structured to minimize susceptibility to injury. Injuries however, are completely unpredictable. After one occurs, its resulting psychological trauma can create a decrease in training and progress in practicing the sport. A cursory review of the literature will be presented examining different ways in which physical injury can affect an athlete’s performance and cognitive processes. A critical question to be examined is the extent to which physical injury impacts an athlete’s long term performance.