Exploring Common Ground: Comparing the Imagery of Dancers and Aesthetic Sport Performers

Abstract

The imagery of aesthetic sport athletes and dancers was compared, and the relationship between imagery and self-confidence was explored. Materials included the Sport Imagery Questionnaire (SIQ; Hall, Mack, Paivio, & Hausenblas, 1998), the Dance Imagery Questionnaire (DIQ; Nordin & Cumming, 2006), the Trait Sport Confidence Inventory (TSCI; Vealey, 1986), and open-ended questions. Participants were 144 dancers and 124 aesthetic athletes, mainly female, 18.98 (SD = 3.91) years old, and ranging from recreational to elite levels. Aesthetic athletes engaged in less imagery of roles and movement quality than dancers, and seemingly less imagery overall. Dancers at higher levels imaged more frequently than lower level dancers, but this was not the case for athletes. Performers who imaged more frequently were more confident, and for dancers the DIQ predicted additional variance in self-confidence beyond that offered by the SIQ. Altogether, the DIQ might be suitable for investigating the imagery of aesthetic athletes as well as dancers.

The authors wish to thank Gemma Jephcote and Lucy Borrett for their assistance with data collections.

Notes

Note that this classification system was only designed to be accurate within each activity type (sport or dance). We make no direct comparisons between athletes and dancers of a particular level in our analyses, and we do not wish to suggest that, for example, intermediate dancers are necessarily equivalent in level to intermediate athletes.

At the time of distribution for the present study, the participants completed an earlier version of the DIQ which consisted of 28 items. The DIQ was subsequently shortened to 16 items through confirmatory factor analyses. Consequently, the results presented here are based on the 16-item set that was retained in the final version of the questionnaire (see Nordin & Cumming, 2006).

∗Significant at the p < .05 level

∗∗Significant at the p < .01 level