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Mental Toughness: What Is It and How To Train It Through Interventions?

Benjamin Gilbert

(6184543)

Brock University

KIN 3P99

Kimberly Gammage

22​nd ​April, 2020

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Mental Toughness: What Is It and How To Train It Through Interventions?

Introduction

Across all of life's facets people are constantly required to perform. Whether it be in business,

education or sports, people are under pressure to achieve performance goals, both from themselves and

their external environment. The ability to perform to a high standard regardless of demanding

circumstances can be influenced by an individual's mental toughness (MT). MT is defined by Gucciardi et

al., (2008) as the following:

“Mental toughness is a collection of values, attitudes, behaviours, and emotions that enable you to

persevere and overcome any obstacle, adversity, or pressure experienced, but also to maintain

concentration and motivation when things are going well to consistently achieve your goals” (p.

278).

This definition emphasises that MT is a multidimensional attribute that promotes success, during good

times and bad. Promoting that performances are consistent and completed to a high standard. Across the

various streams of research there have been seven underlying characteristics identified for contributing to

the strength of MT as described by Gucciardi et al., (2014). These include; self-efficacy, resilience,

context knowledge, emotion regulation, attention regulation, success mindset and optimism (Gucciardi et

al., 2014). This paper will review the thesis, MT training interventions that target the seven underlying

characteristics are successful at improving performance quality and consistency.

Body

The first underlying characteristic is self-efficacy, it derives from self-efficacy theory which was

proposed by Bandura et al., (1999) which is the belief in one's abilities to succeed. This links to the

second characteristic, success mindset, which determines the individual's desire to succeed. However they

are different in the sense that self efficacy is if you think you can succeed, whereas a success mindset is if

you want to succeed. Success mindset derives from the theory of grit and hope, described by Duckworth
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et al., (2007). Resilience is another key construct of MT, literature also refers to this as buoyancy, these

terms are interchangeable. Resilience is the extent to which one can perform their role amongst the

pressures and challenges of the situation (Gucciardi et al., 2014). This can be in whether everyday life or

sport competition (Gucciardi et al, 2014). Having optimism is commonly known, and it is a critical

characteristic of MT (Gucciardi et al., 2014). It is the mindset of an individual that has a positive outlook

on their future actions and events (Gucciardi et al., 2014). Having an awareness of your responsibilities

and aims in a situation is necessary for the next characteristic, context knowledge. It is critical for

performers to understand their sport fully, so they have clarity of what they are expected to do when

performing in the competitive environment. Emotion and attention regulation complete the list of

underlying characteristics. Controlling both emotion and attention enables performers to focus on relevant

emotions and external information to excel in competition, by disregarding distracting or detrimental

stimuli (Gucciardi et al., 2014). Existing research has focused on interventions, to train and develop

specific characteristics of MT. Some research includes all of the discussed constructs, whilst others focus

on a select few to develop athlete performance in specific sport contexts.

Each of the seven underlying characteristics can be strengthened in their own particular way and

can individualised for sporting and athlete preference. Existing research has found effective exercises for

each characteristic. Many exercises involve increasing athlete awareness of their performance, internal

environment and external environment. Intervention exercises to increase self efficacy consist of a

mixture of confidence building exercises. This entails identifying their recent successes and their

strengths, to boost confidence in their ability. Another intervention for self efficacy is using imagery

techniques. This involves visualising how they want certain situations to play out in detail, for example a

golfer visualising the ball rolling into the hole on an important putt, a technique described by Nicholls

(2017, pp. 172-182). Resilience can be built through developing an understanding of how the athlete

themselves could have overcome previous challenges, as described by Gucciardi et al., (2009). After
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understanding how they may have improved in previous experiences athletes should practice solution

focused thinking, and take control in challenging situations (Gucciardi et al., 2009). To improve context

knowledge, athletes need to gain awareness of their performance processes and outcomes, by reflecting

on training and competitive games, with coaches and teammates (Gucciardi et al., 2009). Emotion

regulation is key to being able to control thoughts, feelings and arousal, so the athlete can channel

necessary emotions to help complete intended behaviours. Having a pre-post match routine, such as

meditation or listening to music are effective methods to gain control over one's emotions, as described by

Kucharski et al., (2018). However, these strategies are difficult to implement during a match. Breathing

mechanisms can be used to raise and lower arousal levels during a match control arousal and assist in the

completion of a behaviour (Kucharski et al., 2018). To gain an optimistic outlook is about developing a

success mindset, which can be trained by using a self talk strategy. A particularly successful self talk

method entails athletes to alter a negative perception by coupling it to a positive one, this inspires

confidence in their ability and can be very motivational, as described by Miles & Neil (2013). Training

attention regulation is about teaching the athlete’s brain to focus on task relevant stimuli, this can pertain

to negative internal thoughts and external distractions (Gucciardi et al., 2009). To train attentional focus

athletes can use a random number grid or concentration grid, in which they identify specific numbers

whilst under the pressure of a time restriction (Gucciardi et al., 2009). This time restriction helps to mimic

stress they encounter in a game, and train them to narrow their focus in pressure moments (Gucciardi et

al., 2009). All of these exercises may work for most people, but of course there are individual preferences.

What may work for one athlete might be completely different for the next, this offers athletes the

opportunity to experiment with different exercises and see which is most effective for them.

Most of the research on improving MT has been through interventions. Interventions involve

training of the characteristics, and measuring the improvements in performance in order to determine the

effectiveness of the intervention. Research conducted on competitive British cricket players by Bell et al.,
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(2013), compared MT and batting performance results before and after the intervention. The training was

completed over 46 days, in which athletes were subjected to cricket practice under different pressure

situations (Bell et al., 2013). Pressure training days were split into a repeated four day cycle, which

involved, pressure training, testing, review and goal setting (Bell et al., 2013). This cycle enabled athletes

to practice skills in both a non-pressure and pressure situation, and reflect on their experience before

setting attainable goals for future sessions (Bell et al., 2013). The goal setting phase is where athletes

trained specific MT characteristics including process goal setting, imagery and refocus techniques, self

talk, arousal regulation and cognitive restructuring (Bell et al., 2013). The psychological skill

development phase directly taught the athletes to improve performance by implementing coping strategies

in a competitive pressure situation (Bell et al., 2013). MT has its own direct measure called the MT

Inventory as used by Bell et al., (2013), The MT inventory is an eight item self-report questionnaire,

where performers rate how accurately statements describe the way they typically behave and think as an

athlete, as described by Hardy et al., (2013). The MT results for this study showed a significant rise in the

MT of the athletes after completing the intervention (Bell et al., 2013). This matches results from repeated

performance tests which showed significant increases in athlete batting and fitness performance (Bell et

al., 2013). What this study highlights is that through practice of physical skills in non-pressure and

pressure situations, alongside psychological skill training allows athletes to take control of their

performance in competition and perform to a higher level (Bell et al., 2013).

As previously discussed, a crucial part of MT is being able to maintain the high level

performance. Sustaining MT requires continuous practice of the underlying characteristics. One particular

study demonstrates the importance of specific MT practice, in 2009 researchers manipulated different

types of intervention training for youth Australian football players (Gucciardi et al., 2009). A control

group did not train any psychological or MT skills, and focused solely on physical training (Gucciardi et

al., 2009). A psychological skills training group targeted multiple psycho-educational attributes including
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self regulation, mental rehearsal and self efficacy (Gucciardi et al., 2009). An MT training group were

taught a large number of MT specific characteristics that were identified in previous Gucciardi (2008)

research. Constructs from the 2008 research included the seven underlying characteristics, as well as,

team unity, tough attitude, work ethic, sport intelligence and self motivation (Gucciardi et al., 2008). Both

of the training groups had a session once a week for six weeks, so they can practice their exercises leading

up to, and during the competitive season. The results of this study found that both the MT specific

training and the psychological training had more positive changes in MT than the control group, although

MT specific training had greater increases in resilience (Gucciardi et al., 2009). These results demonstrate

that MT training boosts performance, in addition to the ability to bounce back from adversity and then

succeed. The results from both Gucciardi et al., (2009) and Bell et al., (2013) highlight that in order to

consistently be motivated and perform at a high level, both MT and physical attributes require repeated,

goal specific practice.

Future research

To test the applicability to MT training, one must explore beyond the world of sports and into

workplace environments that also exude stress from pressure situations. A great area for MT research to

explore is medicine. Surgeons in particular, face high amounts of stress when operating, they are

responsible for someone's life. A surgeon's responsibility is a very different type of pressure compared to

that of someone taking a football penalty. Limited research on this topic has been conducted by Percy et

al., (2019), where they simply compare the MT scores of staff and resident surgeons. Staff surgeons are

experienced practitioners, and residents are still training (Percy et al., 2019). They found that staff

surgeons had significantly higher MT than resident surgeons when tested using the MT inventory (Percy

et al., 2019). Nonetheless, all surgeons expressed interest in improving their MT and learning new

techniques, to better deal with stress in their environment in the future (Percy et al., 2019). Although

limited, this research opens the door for future MT research on the effectiveness of healthcare workers.
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Research would be welcomed, as there is a clear demand from the professionals for MT exercises to be

implemented in training. Another possibility for future research would be to explore other stakeholders in

sports, in particular referees and officials. Game officials are responsible for making difficult and often

split second decisions, if made incorrectly it can cost teams championships. The pressure they feel during

a game is amplified by comments from coaches, players and spectators. Therefore, being able to focus

and control their emotions in the face of this stress would be a great asset, as it would help them make

better, more confident decisions consistently. Training the MT characteristics in specific sports through

interventions have shown to be successful at improving performance in competition. This is down to the

training of task or sport relevant MT characteristics. By isolating and training key characteristics of MT

for a specific sport, the exercises are more applicable to competitive situations and in turn performance

improvement. However, it is necessary to not overload the performer with exercises or thought processes,

as this can cause greater stress and hinder performance. Therefore, it is important to select sport specific

MT characteristics that need the most attention and development. All of which requires repeated practice,

just as one would with physical abilities, practice is crucial in the maintenance of MT, and doing so will

result in greater consistency between high level performances.

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