Abstract
A review of self regulation has shown that self monitoring is fundamental to it by examining basic volitional factors of activation and use of goals, goal setting, self evaluation, meta-skills, self regulation failure, and self efficacy. In research, definition, procedures, and methods of self monitoring which may lead to issues of consistency and authority are not conformed. Future researchers will be required to emphasize on varied phenomenological aspects of psychosomatic function for procedural methods of self monitoring to be clearer.
Introduction
The focus of current research is the complicated process of self regulation which is an important aspect in somatic and cognitive behavior therapies. Various factors which are closely related seem to govern self-regulation with no singular factor being responsible for its success or failure. In sporting, self regulation is considered useful to a person’s mental temperament. Vealey, Hayashi, Garner-Holman, and Giacobbi (1998) developed a questionnaire for three hundred and thirty five college athletes, over a variety of experimental trials which tested the sources of their confidence in sports.
Nine sources of sport confidence were identified in the outcome of the exercise, and categorized into: success, good climatic conditions, and self regulation. The ratings by the athletes were first achievement which included demonstration of ability and self mastery. Second was self regulation which includes physical and mental presentation and preparation. Finally, climate which encompassed situational favorableness, environmental comfort, vicarious experience, social support, and the leadership of the coaches was identified. This was the order of perceived priority with regard to the vital sources of sport confidence improvement.
The opinion and expectations of team performance is greatly influenced by an individuals self monitoring skill (Kim, 1999) as well as the team’s environment. (Kim & Cho, 1996). They also influence the confidence of success. Consequently, the awareness of self control boosts the confidence and performance of an individual in a task. However, engaging in behavioral change strategy requires the clarification and definition of mechanism of self regulation.
Mechanisms
An extensive review of self regulation mechanisms which underlie somatic and cognitive based learning in performance has been conducted by Karoly (1993) who defines self regulation as the processes which may be internal or transactional which makes it possible for a person to guide his or her goal directed acts across varying contexts over time. According to her, regulation is modulation of thought, attention affect, or behavior through deliberate use of specific mechanisms and supportive meta-skills. When a common activity is impeded or when goal directing is made salient, the process of self regulation becomes initiated.
The stable element which tries to direct behavior along a given specific path to a directed purpose seems to be self-regulation. However, basic volitional factors also characterize the process of self regulation besides the conceptual, epistemic, and procedural variations in various models of self regulation. (Karoly, 1993) An analysis of the basic tenants listed in self regulation models may aid in singling out major issues in performance improvement.
Understanding Goals
The main directors of action are goals. How goals guide an individual’s actions and how their pursuit is regulated has been the main focus of research in this field. However, the main questions which are central to the study of how goals are pursued and direct actions is their sources and the aspect which is specified in a goal state. An individual’s need for approval and the aim to excel in a given profession, for instance sports, often produce desires and wishes aimed at incentives which are attractive. The perceived demands of the circumstance or the situation at hand are what is normally recognized as the incentive. For instance, only when professional success or approval is seen as contingent upon productivity will it qualify to be termed as an incentive (Schunk, 2004). However, goal setting requires that individual commit himself to exhibiting actions which are likely to produce incentives which are likely to produce the incentives which are desired.
Furthermore, the content of the action goals which the individual seek to pursue will be determined by individual belief on the type of actions which will lead to the goal state (Aizen, 2005). With this regard, it seems as if the ultimate sources of action goals are needs and higher order goals while the actual content of action goals is determined by the belief by an individual about what qualifies as an incentive and what leads to it.
Goals play a very important role in the organization of human behavior as well as in the formation of motivational constructs and analysis Pulkkinnen et al., (2002). Many theorists have held the position that the study of goal and goal related cognition is synonymous with the study of motivation and that human action is instigated and directed by goals rather than motives and inner needs. In an attempt to answer the question of how a motivated individual attain conscious goals, extant goal theorists have partially ignored the interaction between needs and goals manifested in psychological health. In other words, goal theories as much as they examine how an individual pursues goals do not address why the individual in question pursues particular goals or the importance of ‘what’ specific goals are pursued. Yet they are all important in comprehending the relevance and experiential qualities attached to goal activity and how it impact on the well being of an individual functionally.
The answer to why an individual pursues particular goals has a direct consequence on how the goal pursuit is regulated because it is concerned with the source of the goals. Specifically, answering the question why a given action is performed by an individual shades light into the underlying regulatory process and this has numerous functional and experiential impacts. Most important to answering the ‘why’ question is whether an individual sees that the goal directed behavior is initiated from within oneself or externally. (Heider, 1958; Ryan and Connell, 1989) This issue has to do with the extent to which an action is independent or self determined and is analyzed by looking into the perceived locus of causality which comes with the selection of goals and engagement. Its content is addressed by the ‘what’ question. What, for instance, is the impact of pursuing one thing other than another?
Individuals engage in intentional behavior if they view it as a way through which they are more likely to achieve a particular goal or yield a desired result. Having identified this, recent theories on motivated behavior have the concept of intention as their central focus. As such, when individuals exhibit purposeful behavior with the aim or intention of achieving a goal, they are often referred to as motivated. Within such theories, motivation is considered a unitary concept with variances in intensity mainly as a function of belief about an individual’s ability to achieve the desired outcome. From this generalized perspective, the major concern becomes the factors which facilitate motivation such as intentional behavior as opposed to lack of it. Researchers, in addressing this issue, have found that high levels of motivation emanates from an internal locus of control above self efficacy, high expectation and response-outcome dependence. (Gollwitzer, et al. 1996).
On the other hand, phenomenological approaches to motivation have broadened their scope from mere distinction between factors which lead to lack of motivation (referred to by Deci and Ryan (1985) as a motivation) and motivation, to distinction among the qualitatively different kinds of motivated behavior. This has been done through focusing on the experienced locus of impetus of individuals’ motivated behavior. For instance, what exactly drives a person to pursue a given goal? Can these be attributed to external pressures and forces? Or are they initiated by individual’s inner self? According to Deci and Ryan (1985, 1991), intentional or motivated behaviors vary in the extent to which they are independent or self determined against controlled. Independent behaviors are those felt as emanating internally or having an “internally perceived locus of causality” (DeCharms, 1968).
Controlled behaviors on the other hand are those exerted by social or intrapsychic force which is outside the self. Even though independent and controlled behaviors are motivated, purposive and intentional, they both vary in phenomenological character and how they impact on the quality of behavioral engagement and the functioning of personality in general. Various studies have revealed that when individuals perceive their intentional actions as internally oriented or as possessing internal locus of causality, they tend to exhibit greater creativity, (e.g., Amabile, 1983), high self esteem (e.g., Ryan and Grolnick, 1986) and better psychological and physical well-being (e.g., Langer and Rodin, 1976) than when they are controlled. The level of motivation for the two situations may not be different but their orientation differs resulting in different quality of functioning. (Ryan and Connell, 1989).
Traditional distinctions of intentional actions with regard to their perceived locus of causality laid emphasis on the contrast between extrinsically motivated behavior and intrinsically motivated behavior (Deci, 1975). Intrinsically motivated behavior refers to the prototypes of independent or self determined actions since they are performed because of the essential satisfaction they offer and out of interest. When motivated intrinsically, individuals desire to engage in the activity hence no external drives are needed. Intrinsic motivation is evident from the early developments of a child which can be seen in his or her level of spontaneity, curiosity and interest manifested in the tendency to assimilate and mastery strivings (White, 1958). Therefore, perceived locus of causality in intrinsically motivated behavior is internal. The reward for activity in intrinsic motivation is the spontaneous cognitions and affect which are essential in the performance of the activity. On the other hand, the reward in extrinsic motivation can be separated from the behavior itself.
Setting Goals
In so far as motivation is a greater influence to an athlete’s approach to competition and training (Weinberg, 1984), attitude and belief (Gill, 1986), different levels of directed behavior for a given aim is dependent upon initiation and devotion to setting goals. (Brunelle, Janelle, & Tennant, 1999; Chen & Singer, 1992; Green-Demers, Pelletier, Stewart, & Gushue, 1998; Kane, Marks, Zaccaro, & Blair, 1996) Goals prioritized and implemented strategically according to the aims of the individual greatly influence the direction of behavior. It becomes increasingly difficult to change treatment to coincide with long term goals once a particular self regulation treatment has been learned and adopted for a given behavior. In other words, a divergence from the original trail may lead to it not being found and hence, initial approach to self regulation needs clear and well defined goal setting.
Self Monitoring
Goal setting having been developed, the capacity to self monitor becomes necessary since attention to internal and external factors result in a more relevant control of intervention strategies through a greater self awareness. Attention to internal states such as sensations, feelings and thoughts, and to external states such as environment and body movement is not the same fact to attention styles even though they do have common characteristics. Attention styles include the relationship of perception selection to a changing environment (Zaichkowsky, 1984).
There is a variety of attention styles which range from broad and narrow to internal and external focus of attention. Broad external focus on attention is important in comprehending complicated sports situation and assessing the environment while broad internal focus on attention is important in analyzing sport within the realm of strategies and plans and for future anticipated occurrences. Narrow external focus on attention on the other hand enables one to focus attention on the relevant stimuli at the right time with the appropriate responses while narrow internal focus on attention provides one with the ability self motivate and calm (Nideffer, 1981).
The combinations of these attention foci have degrees and levels within and across individuals. These types of attention styles are inclined to personality or are trainable is still not clear even though they seem to be related to the level of internal and external distraction (Singer et al., 1991) and the level of individual automatic and conscious control for a given specific task Hardy, Mullen & Jones, 1996). For instance, it is the capacity of the athlete to intervene and separate important and non-important mental content associated with a specific stimulus and comprehend when to override actions consciously. The whole process is geared by effective self monitoring skill.
Understanding Self-monitoring
To achieve effective self monitoring, Snyder (1997) has separated those individuals who regulate their behavior using cues from others and those controlled by their attitudes and effective states from within. These distinct types involve high and low self monitors. However, separating these self monitoring criteria into two ignores a number of variables which also play a role in self monitoring process. The definition of self monitoring is one of the variables normally assumed to be the self awareness level which an individual possess over psychological content.
However, the high and low self monitor which has been defined by Snyder (1979) seems to lie on the external rather than internal cues. For instance, individual defined as a high self monitor adopts external cues or the behavior of people towards them as a prerequisite of the required behavior modification from a given situation. This may be unfavorable under sporting competitions even though it could be appropriate for social events where the observation of etiquette is necessary. Subsequently, low self monitors adopt internal cues as behavior modification indicator. Low self monitors would be an advantage for most sporting situations since they are unlikely to deteriorate with diverse external cues, instead remaining psychologically stable in a changing environment.
The definition posed by Snyder (1979) to varying self monitoring characteristics may not directly address the appropriate use of self monitoring. More particularly, unlike low self monitors, high self monitors track the environment more than they monitor themselves. The intention of the definition is therefore beaten by attaching the process of self monitoring to high self monitors. In the actual sense, high self monitors monitor the environment while low self monitors monitor themselves.
Contradictory results have been realized in some studies with this definition of self monitors. For instance, Chattergee, Hunt and Kernan (1999) discovered that in an experiment involving information processing, a higher mean recognition scores were realized by low self monitors than high self monitors contrary to what Snyder’s definition would have achieved. Because of better self observational power, high self monitors ought to be improved at cognitive processing. It can be attributed to the ability of high self monitors to distinguish external cues better than internal hence; lack of internal attention will be observed when a cognitive task is given.
Lester (1997) carried out a research and found out that in social situations, high self monitoring subjects experienced varied aspects of external behavior more than low self monitoring subjects. It was discovered that external cues alter behavior by high self monitors than low self monitors. Although these results are in line with high self monitor’s performance predicted by Snyder, it does not indicate whether the subjects could observe their psychological content or they simply knew they were behaving differently. Subsequently, the low self monitors did not indicate whether they chose to ignore their reaction to the external cues thereby preserving the state of the self.
Macrae, Bodenhausen and Milne (1998) found that low self monitors were capable of suppressing social stereotypes more than high self monitors. This is to denote that a reversal of the terms of high and low self monitors is necessary when handling self regulation than adhering to external cues. The inference with regard to self monitoring aspects is further supported by Webb, Marsh, Schneiderman and Davis (1989) who found a better ability by low self monitors to manipulate private self awareness than high self monitors. However, high self monitors were in a better position to manipulate public self awareness than the low self monitors.
Personality type can influence self monitoring. Gender also seem to have a role to play in self monitoring and regulation in diverse sociocultural setting (Reckers & Varni, 1977). However, it is unclear, particularly in sports, whether this is hereditary or socioeconomic construct (Anshel & Porter, 1996). The level of motor skill and expertise correlate with enhanced self monitoring as the athlete learns different individual strategies which can improve skills with experience. These strategies may be restricted in development. Some people may disregard important information from observation in an attempt to shield the ego from self criticism thereby limiting the effectiveness of self monitoring. Even though it seems different attention styles can be learned, styles that field dependence or independence and locus of control are important in influencing perceived external and internal cues. Observation and imitation has power on self monitoring ability when perfecting a particular skill. Familiarity of with self monitoring may limit the ability of the athlete to maintain constant and consistent efforts of self monitoring. The competence of individual performance may be influenced by multiple factors even before the implementation of sufficient self monitoring. Failure to consider these factors in the initial implementation of strategies for self regulation on self monitoring may lead to the set goal not being achieved.
Reliability and self accuracy of self reports is also another factor which influence self monitoring and self monitoring research. Greater reliability across time was provided by low self monitors than high self monitors according to findings by Nasby (1989). The explanation is that individuals with high private self consciousness articulate self schemata of great temporal stability than those with low private self consciousness. The ability of an individual to self monitor appear to be manipulated by several causes, factors and situational dependencies which may not be said to be exclusively due to individual differences but the methods of data collection employed.
The process of self monitoring in sports has largely been focused on performance based results. To be able improve on performance; self regulation and self monitoring become concerted on particular motor tasks. The assumption is that performance outcome correlated with feedback from self monitoring. For instance, the success of self monitoring is tested against performance such that if performance increases within a given time, self monitoring will be viewed as successful. This facilitates the collection and correlation of quantitative data with possible qualitative increases in self regulatory and self monitoring processes.
For example, Anshel and Porter (1996a, 1996b), Zimmerman and Kitsantas (1996), Kitsantas and Zimmerman (1998), Ryska (1998), have used self reports, questionnaires, and inventories to distinguish between the indicators of skill performance of specific tasks and the level of self monitoring ability. Their finding was that regardless of the skill, skill performance increases with an increase in self mentoring combined with self regulatory strategies. An intervention method was used in increasing task performance with regard to self regulation and self monitoring in sports.
Goal setting and Activation
Another feature in self regulation is activation of goal directed behaviors so as to direct a personal response to the performance of tasks. Karoly, (1993) notes that Internal and external cues give rise to thought modulation, behavior or affect after self monitoring for a given period of time. Long term working memory stores these responses which can scan psycho-physiological content when carrying out a particular task and alert the subject of the imminent limitations in behavior so as to produce conscious intervention. Self regulatory response becomes generated by conscious intervention.
First, the entire self regulatory operation is not controlled with a single mind but by a multiple mind approach. As such, self regulatory processes operate under the control of various interconnected mind centers. Intellectual strategies are required by self regulatory procedures which use conceptualization to intervene in matters related to cognition whereas; somatic strategies are required by those self regulatory procedures meant to change movement. On the other hand, emotional self regulation requires affective based strategies. Suitable self regulation strategies may be employed under goal directives if the self regulation procedure identifies accurately the main mode of function used in the given task.
Secondly, in the identification of relevant cues, self awareness becomes important. Self monitoring before, during and after the task increases awareness of the cues that need to be identified and changed so as to be consistent with the intended goals. Further learning in self regulation requires reflective ability even though fundamental change can only be realized by real time self monitoring.
Self evaluative judgment
Detecting discrepancies between current behavior and ideal behavior is an important feature in self regulation. This should however be according to goal setting objectives. When comparing current and ideal behavior, motivation and knowledge of the results seem to have great effects. Self regulatory strategies are influenced by discrepancies detected by self evaluation within the spectrum of unfavorable or favorable behavior followed by self consequation by strengthening or reducing behavior through self communication which can either be positive or negative.
Several factors influence discrepancy detection and the procedure involved after self consequation and evaluation in self regulation. These includes a level of increase in behavior related with putting effort following the result of a substandard performance being greater for individuals who possess high self efficacy than those low in it. Self efficacy theory holds that a wider based knowledge, discrepancy detection skills, particular monitoring and implementation are not sufficient enough top guarantee goal based performance as evidenced by the fact that individuals often do not do what they are perfectly good at thereby hindering goal attainment. In other words, self efficacy seem to be ones own perception of his capacity to perform actions needed to handle a particular task.
However, it remains unclear whether beliefs about the ability to self monitor, confidence in self evaluation, dispositional style, planning, personality or motivation influence self efficacy. Whether standards are self set or determined externally determines performance in achievement situations. Again, effort and self appraisal is affected by the degree of displacement or mismatch between standard affects and performance. Negative evaluation effects after a performance which is substandard on tasks that are complex are opposite to those found on simple tasks. The rate at which the performance changes within a given time and the absolute level of discrepancy between performance and standard are related to satisfaction. The self reward process can be affected by social comparison. For instance, when other individuals are known to have performed better and self reward become diminished after successful performance and when others are known to have performed poorly and self punishment is diminished after a poor performance.
The implementation of discrepancy detection skill such as a wide scope of mental skills techniques determine the factors that influence self evaluative judgment effectiveness and self consequation. However, effective self monitoring results in the initial discrepancy detecting ability.
Self regulation
The self regulatory process requires Meta cognition which is responsible for governing holistic coordination of self regulation. The volitional freedom to practice self influence in self regulation needs the right temporal activation, memory retrieval, the capacity to learn, self reflectiveness, emotional and intellectual intelligence. A greater perspective for guiding attitudes and beliefs about effective ways of self regulation can be obtained by cognizing what an individual is doing in regulating self beyond the implementation of self regulating strategies. An effective final self regulation plan is dependent upon the level of self knowledge obtained with regard to the task. This is because meta-skills enable one to freely become accustomed to different conditions in accordance with goal directed skills through inner development, guided by knowledge and experience. There are boundary conditions which overlay self regulatory process.
The first one is inferential boundaries which are epistemic limits that an individual is subjected to. As much as it is assumed that self regulation is an individual effort, there are various social factors which contribute to its effectiveness since the pursuit of goals involve the assistance of other people. Secondly, there are those outstanding limits to self regulation realization referred to as operational boundaries. People who possess requisite skills and are high in self efficacy will not act toward goals when there are no incentives. No one works to achieve what they feel is already in their possession.
Conclusion
Self monitoring is the basis for self regulation. In the literature concerning self monitoring, there are many issues which seem to have no consensus which includes the definition of self monitoring, its method and exactly what is to be self monitored. Different bases for categorizing high and low self monitors are used in defining self monitoring. For instance, more public awareness exists in high self monitors than low self monitors. On the other hand, there is more private awareness in low self monitors than in high self monitors. If self monitoring is defined as the ability to look at oneself then high and low self monitors can be interchanged.
This reviewed literature concerning sports and motor skill performance correlated self regulation and self monitoring with the outcome of performance. There seem to be numerous cognitive, somatic and cognitive centers which operate in self regulating program and the differences between these centers were not subject to this paper. Within this paper, there is no clear explanation of the specific psychological states involved in self monitoring with regard to emotive or intellectual experience. If individuals have never monitored these states, then it will be difficult for psychological background of performance to result in self awareness.
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