Relationship between Selected Motor Fitness and Psychological Variables with Playing Ability of Male Volleyball Players

INTRODUCTION

A sport is as old as mankind itself. But the concept of sports has been changing from time to time. A long back when the primitive man used sports battle against the natural calamities, to protect him from animals and to secure food for living. With the passage of time sports competitions began to occupy important place in the society. Sports have come handy as communal vehicle that satisfying the basic requirement of the society at all ages. As participants, spectators, or volunteers, people are attracted to sport arguably more than to any other activity. This popularity transcends national, cultural, socio-economic and political boundaries and can be invoked with success in virtually any community in the realm (Barrow, H & McGee, R. (1989). Volleyball from a recreational game has presently developed into a highly competitive game, which requires a high level of fitness, skill efficiency, good physique etc. jump service, introduction of the Libero, variety of attack combinations are some of the examples of recent characteristics of volleyball game. The performance of player now a days are largely influenced by the motor fitness, skill and body composition, because the demands on technical execution of the game have considerably gone up (Clifton, 1962). Physical fitness variables are those variables which are related with different conditions of human body such as strength endurance, flexibility, agility and speed etc. In the field of competitive game like volleyball, the term sports psychology has taken giant strides in a short span of time. The psychological aspects have been emphasized and becoming a vital aspect in the study of psychological characteristics that limit the performance of an individual in a game situation at high level of competition (Terry et.al (1998). Volleyball is a very popular game in India but very less scientific research has been done especially in both the field physical and psychological. Research work in the both field is very important to improve the game through which results can educate the coaches, physical educationist and as well as volleyball players about the role played by physical and psychology variables in attaining the high performance efficiency.

outside hitter players from Panjab University Chandigarh Inter College participants were selected as subjects. The age ranged between 18 to 23 years. Speed, Strength Endurance, Flexibility and Agility variables were used to collect the physical data of participants. Cognitive anxiety, Somatic anxiety and Self- Confidence tests were used to collect psychology data of participants. 50m Dash test was used to measure the speed, Bent knee sit-ups was used to measure strength endurance, Sit and reach test was used to measure flexibility, Shuttle run was used to measure agility and Cognitive anxiety, Somatic anxiety, Self- Confidence were measure by Competitive state anxiety inventory (CSAI 1990).

* Significant at 0.05 level of significance r (0.05) (28) = .361 The table-1 showed correlation between independent variables and dependent variable, When the data was analyzed by using Pearson‘s Product moment correlation statistical technique out of 7 selected independent (motor fitness and psychological) variables only 3 were found significantly positive correlated with dependent variable (Playing ability) namely agility (r = .365), Cognitive anxiety (r = 0.689) and self-confidence (0.602).

Motor fitness and psychological variables of male volleyball players of Panjab University Chandigarh inter college and playing ability was found by administering appropriate tests as well as utilization suitable statistics. It has been found that there is a positive relationship between Agility and volleyball playing ability. Agility means the players ability to move his body quickly from one direction to other. It is very important for volleyball players because the greater agility means more ability to move his body in one direction to other during game to defend and to attack the ball simultaneously. A significant relationship was also found between cognitive anxiety and playing ability. This relationship may be due to that optimal level of cognitive anxiety increase the performance of players during competition. Some researchers showed that low level of cognitive anxiety increase the performance of player but in this study data showed positive relationship between cognitive anxiety and playing ability. A positive correlation was also found between self-confidence and playing ability. Self –confidence is the main predictor of performance during competition if a player has low level of self -confidence it will affect his individual as well as the team performance also, this study showed positive relationship between players self- showed no significant relationship with playing ability.

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Research Scholar, Panjab University, Chandigarh