IMPLEMENTING ‘GUIDED IMAGERY’ METHOD IN PSYCHO- CORRECTIVE WORK WITH ATHLETES WITH ANXIETY

1 Doctor of Psychological Sciences, Department of Theoretical and Applied Psychology at Lviv Polytechnic National University, Lviv (Ukraine) ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4245-1443 2 Doctor of Psychological Sciences, Psychology Department at Ukrainian State Employment Service Training Institute, Kyiv (Ukraine) ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4101-9659 3 PhD in Psychology, Department of Theoretical and Applied Psychology at Lviv Polytechnic National University, Lviv (Ukraine) ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4101-9659 IMPLEMENTING ‘GUIDED IMAGERY’ METHOD IN PSYCHOCORRECTIVE WORK WITH ATHLETES WITH ANXIETY


Introduction
The success in athletic competitions requires multifaceted support in athlete's prepara- The research shows the positive correlation between physical exercises and psychological well-being (Hassmén, Koivula, & Uutela, 2000), for example, physical exercises improve self-esteem and lower the anxiety and negative mood (Callaghan, 2004). However, athletes are not immune to mental disorders either (Armstrong & Oomen-Early, 2009;Gulliver, Griffiths, Mackinnon, Batterham, & Stanimirovic, 2015;Schaal et al., 2011;Yang et al., 2007). training, including young martial arts practitioners were studied by Aleskeev, 2006;Boychenko, 2007;Hryn, 2015;Yilyin, 2009;Weinberg, & Gold, 1998;Yakovlev & Babushkin, 2016. In particular, the study of anxiety was done by foreign researchers like Davidson et al., 1965, Spielberger, 1972, and national researchers: Т.А. Nemchyn, 1966N.V. Tarabrina, 1971; Y.L. Khanin, 1978, etc. The personality with the distinctive traits of anxiety, as Spielberger, 1972;1972;Y.L. Khanin, 1978 states, is prone to perceive the environment as such that has threat and danger in much high level comparing to the perception of personality with low anxiety level. On the opinion of L. M. Sobchyk (1990), anxiety indexes positively related to the motivation of avoidance. The anxiety development process includes the following components as the impact of stress-producing factors (sports activity situations), threat perception, and anxiety state itself.
Thus, the author shows that mental and physiological disorders in the athlete's body develop at the stage of threat perception; meanwhile anxiety determiner is a failure prediction (Spielberger, 1972).
Anxiety is the emotional reaction on danger. Unlike fear, it is unclear and indistinct like a fear of unknown. (Karen Horney, 1950). К. Horney introduced the notion of 'neurotic anxiety', the essence of which is the absence of the danger that triggers it or in disproportion between danger and anxiety intensity. Neurotic anxiety is usually as intense as anxiety triggered by real danger.
Certain anxiety level is a natural and necessary trait of active personality. For each person and especially for the athlete, it is intrinsic to have an individual optimal anxiety level, where mental and physical abilities are at maximum.
'Optimal functioning area' of the psycho is intrinsic to each athlete. Athlete's performance efficiency will be at its best when excitement level doesn't exceed this area limits. This way, in Y.
L. Khanin's opinion, athletes will achieve the best results on the condition that they have the highest level of excitement, others will achieve their best at a complete relaxation, and the restat a medium excitement level. imagery techniques were included into the relaxation and stress management training right from the moment they were created (Benson, 1975;Jacobson, 1976;Meichenbaum, 1985;Selye 1974).
Out of all known psychotherapy approaches up to date that utilize imagined patterns, the guided imagery is the most thoroughly Rogers and some of the strategies of behavioral therapy, for example, by J. Wolpe.

Material and Methods
The research was carried out on young martial arts practitioners in the age group from 11 to 15 years old. 10 children with high level of state and trait anxiety out of 60 athletes were selected by means of C. Spielberger and J. Taylor's questionnaires.
The selected children underwent individual psycho-corrective work by guided imagery method for four months. They had 15 sessions total.

Organization of the Research
At the first stage of the research the young martial arts practitioners' level of state and trait anxiety was determined. The only method that allows differentially measure anxiety as both personal (Spielberger, 1972 As a result of diagnostic work, we selected 10 athletes with high level of both state and trait anxiety (6 boys and 4 girls).
The selected young martial arts practitioners, after receiving their parents' agreements, underwent individual psychotherapeutic work for four months (15 sessions) using guided imagery method.
At the second research stage the assessment of dynamics of showings of anxiety level in athletes after psycho-corrective impacts was done. The assessment was carried out according to the J. Taylor's questionnaire. The results are shown in Table 1.

60% of research subjects had a decrease in
anxiety level from high level to medium with tendency to high; 20% of research subjects had a decrease in anxiety level from medium level with the tendency to high to medium level with the tendency to low; 20% of research subjects had a decrease in anxiety level from very high to high level.

Discussion
Based on the research results we were

Conclusion
This article was devoted to study the capabilities of guided imagery method while working on anxiety correction in young athletes. The attempt was made to identify the correlation between psychotherapy session implementation and changes in personal attributes in martial arts practitioners.
So, using corrective impact by means of guided imagery method we proved a positive dynamics in anxiety. More specifically, the athletes with high anxiety levels after retesting upon completion of the corrective program demonstrated lower and more affirmative anxiety index results, beneficial for their personal growth and particularly in sports activities.

Conflicts of interest
The authors state that there were no conflicts of interest.