Analysis of State Anxiety among International Table Tennis Umpires during Commonwealth Table Tennis Championship

Anxiety is an emotion characterized by an unpleasant state of inner turmoil, often accompanied by nervous behavior, such as pacing back and forth, somatic complaints, and rumination. It is the subjectively unpleasant feelings of dread over anticipated events, such as the feeling of imminent death. Anxiety is not the same as fear, which is a response to a real or perceived immediate threat, whereas anxiety is the expectation of future threat. Anxiety is a feeling of uneasiness and worry, usually generalized and unfocused as an overreaction to a situation that is only subjectively seen as menacing. It is often accompanied by muscular tension, restlessness, fatigue and problems in concentration. Anxiety can be appropriate, but when experienced regularly the individual may suffer from an anxiety disorder.State anxiety describes the experience of unpleasant feelings when confronted with specific situations, demands or a particular object or event. State anxiety arises when the person makes a mental assessment of some type of threat. When the object or situation that is perceived as threatening goes away, the person no longer experiences anxiety. Thus, state anxiety refers to a temporary condition in response to some perceived threat. Umpire is a person who is present at a sports competition in order to make certain that the rules of the particular game are obeyed and to judge if particular actions are acceptable. Umpire is an official who watches a game or match closely to enforce the rules and arbitrate on matters arising from the play. It is observed that during higher elite level tournaments, a pressure of correct decision making ability is always there on the umpires. This pressure is doubled with the presence of large number of audience and when contest is of equal level. Impact on decisions may be occurred due to stress while umpiring, which may impact the score too. To analyze this stress on umpires a study was needed to be conducted to find out state anxiety among International Table Tennis Umpires before and during the match.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

Thirty four (34) International Table Tennis Umpires from different countries were selected randomly for this study during 17th Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships 2007 held at Jaipur, Rajasthan. The experience of umpiring in years ranged between 3-5 years at international level. A self-made state anxiety questionnaire was used in which internal validity was checked by Croanbach Alpha. All the items were found valid. Total 28 questions were used in

subjects were asked to give their response according to their comfort. To assess the state anxiety normal probability curve was used. The level of significance was set at 0.05.

It is evident from the table that the mean state anxiety score was 17.6176 with standard deviation of 6.266.µ-σ toµ+σ means moderate anxiety score lies between this.

The result of the present study concludes that most of the umpires are moderately anxious which indicate that most of the umpires are attentive during officiating of the match. Those whose are having less and high state anxiety they are to have more experience of officiating. They can also improve it by the help of experienced colleagues and psychologist. Stress management and situational interventions could also benefit the officials to reduce the sources of stress and to improve officiating skills.

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International Umpire, ITTF Racket Controller, Assistant Professor, Lakshmibai National Institute of Physical Education, Gwalior (MP)