SportsPsychologist.com Blog by Dr Victor Thompson

Wearers of red team uniforms or kits have been shown to do better than those wearing other colours (Attrill et al, 2008). When sport means so much and outcome is often decided in millimetres or thousandths of a second, we should be doing all we can to help our athletes achieve. I think that the GB Olympic designers may have missed an opportunity here to include more red in the design (it is mainly blue). If it were more red, this may have helped give the GB wearers a boost psychologically that would be reflected in physical performance  - for instance, if the red increased confidence, (positive) aggression and sense that they are dominant, then they are likely to perform closer to their peak performance potential. In addition, there may be negative affects on opponents, facing our athletes wearing significant amounts of red, where they assume a less confident and more submissive position in the sporting contests. While these affects are likely to be small, when it...

Sport offers so much to children psychologically: an opportunity to test themselves, to learn rules, to cooperate with others, to accept defeat, to celebrate success (hopefully), to cope with setbacks and much more. The Sports Parent who takes their child to practice, watches them play and then has to deal with whatever mood their child is in afterwards has a tough job to do. You face many dilemmas including: How much should you encourage your child to do the sport? When is your encouragement too much, at risk of being perceived as coercion or pushing them into it? How do you help your child cope with mistakes and bad performances? With other children, coaches, officials who show unfairness? Or cope with other parents who take a very different approach from you regarding how sport should be played by kids? What makes your job as the Sports Parent all the more difficult is the fact that you really care about your child. You don’t want them to be upset. You don’t want sport to hu...