Momentum

I presented my study on flow in competitive contexts at the International Positive Psychology Association conference this week. You can download a copy of my poster here: http://bit.ly/nD4jm0
In a nutshell: Traditionally in flow research, the more competitive you are, the less likely you are to experience flow in competition, because you'll be focused on the results instead of the process. This didn't square with my experiences as an athlete, so I wondered if it might depend on the meaning you attributed to competition - basically, whether you saw it as a means for demonstrating who's a winner and who's a loser, or whether you saw beating other people as a way to track your own skill development. I surveyed 455 triathletes, runners and cyclists, and found that competitiveness and flow were positively correlated among those who see competition as a means for their own development. There are many other interesting findings here, which I will detail in another article.