Behavior Change: Social Persuasion, and Emotional and Physical States

Increasing an athlete’s self-efficacy is integral to creating positive behavior change. We have previously discussed how to use mastery experiences and vicarious experiences as a means to increasing an athlete’s self-efficacy. This is the final article in this series and it will focus on using social persuasion and emotional and physical states as a way to increase an athlete’s self-belief.

The use of verbal feedback and encouragement is another way to increase self-efficacy. This source of self-efficacy is called social persuasion. CrossFit is built around feedback. That’s what coaching is: provide instruction, watch your athletes perform the task, and provide feedback. In the CrossFit Level 1 and Level 2  Courses, the acronym WICCAR is used to describe the proper coaching steps when correcting an athlete. WICCAR = Watch->Identify a fault->Correct the fault->Check the correction->Acknowledge improvements->Repeat. When correcting movement, coaches utilize different cueing techniques to improve faults. Providing positive feedback, especially after a correction has been made, is very important. This encouragement provides the athlete with belief they can perform the movement correctly and translates to other movements. Positive reinforcement should always be balanced with corrective feedback. It is great to cue an athlete to “lift your chest as you descend,” but better when you follow it up with, “That’s way better. Nice work!” A barrage of corrections without acknowledging improvements can have a deleterious effect on self-efficacy. You don’t want the athlete to walk away thinking, “I can’t do anything right!”

Coaches should also look out for and acknowledge behaviors the newer athlete does well. If you notice an athlete is coming in 15 minutes before class to work on a specific movement or skill, celebrate their effort. This type of practice to develop a new skill or overcome a challenge is exactly what you want when it comes to creating mastery experiences. Do your best as a coach to solidify these behaviors. Positive feedback is key.

Verbal persuasion can also come from other gym members, especially those in the same class. It is up to the coach and affiliate owner to prioritize the group experience. Encourage athletes to cheer each other on when completing a workout together, and celebrate each other’s personal records. When an athlete finishes a workout, discourage them from jumping right into their cool-down, or starting to clean up their weights and barbell. Encourage them to gather around the athletes who are still working and cheer them on. Having the support of your peers, and listening to them yell, “You can do this!” is a great way to increase self-efficacy. This effect can be maximized by keeping your members grouped together. The more you split up into specialized classes, or specialized programming to certain groups, the more you detract from social persuasion and modeling.

Positive self-talk is another way to create social persuasion. Trainers should work on taking any negative feelings and turning them into positive affirmations. It can be as simple as turning, “I’m not sure I can complete this workout,” into, “This workout will be tough. I know I can do this.” This teaches the athlete to provide their own encouragement and create a mindset based on accomplishing the tasks ahead of them. The goal is to get them to recognize the challenge and accept it as a necessary aspect of improvement. 

The last source of self-efficacy comes through managing emotional and physical states. New CrossFit athletes will likely go through many different emotional states as they progress through CrossFit. They will have to enter the gym for the first time, likely go through an on-ramp program, and then enter themselves into the regular classes. There will be times of nervousness as they attempt a challenging benchmark, learn a new skill, or practice a complex movement. It is up to the coach to address these emotions and teach athletes that these emotions are normal and part of the program. Coaches should also teach acceptance, and use tools to create willingness.

Willingness can be increased through practicing positive self-talk, self-imagery, or reframing the negative feeling into something positive. “I’m nervous about performing this workout” can be turned into, “I’ve performed workouts like this before and succeeded.” These athletes are learning how to manage their emotions and create a more positive outlook, further increasing their self-efficacy. This type of reframing can be powerful, as the athlete is not necessarily trying to change the way they feel about the stressor, but reframing how they decide to deal with those feelings. In this example, the athlete might continue to feel nervous about the workout, but they end up accepting the challenge with a willingness to push through based on past successes.

We’ve all had a new athlete come into the gym and express anxiety about starting CrossFit: “I am very out of shape, and I am afraid this is going to be too hard.” This is framed as a problem: I am out of shape and CrossFit is too hard. As a coach, we can reframe this. We can turn, “I am out of shape” into, “You are at your starting point. With work, you will see  dramatic improvements in your performance.” This is typically true, as newer athletes see massive improvements due to quick nervous system adaptations. We can reframe, “CrossFit is too hard” into, “Today is going to be hard, but you can get through it, making the next day a little bit easier.” This is also true. Though the next training day might not be physically easier, you have reframed this problem into a challenge, and by completing this challenge, the athlete will likely go into the next training session with more confidence. It has been shown that increased self-efficacy has been associated with lower measurements of RPE, making similar tasks feel easier to complete.

The same goes for physiological states. New athletes will get sore and fatigued, and  feel physical and physiological stress during workouts that they have never felt before. You can expect a new athlete to become concerned with a rapidly increasing heart rate, if they have never felt that before. The same goes for rapid increases in respiratory rate, or the burning sensation in muscles that approach fatigue. It can help to navigate this early, letting them know what to expect, teaching them to accept it as a means to improvement, and providing a plan to handle it. Coaches can teach athletes how to breathe to calm down mid-workout, stretches to perform post-workout to reduce soreness, and other techniques to improve their rate of recovery. This will ease anxiety and lead to a better sense of accomplishment as they accomplish new tasks, deal with the physical demands head on, and recover with confidence to take on a new challenge.

Setting up the gym environment to increase each athlete’s self-efficacy can be a powerful tool for increasing or maintaining program adherence. In these articles, we have talked specifically about CrossFit adherence, but remember that self-efficacy is task specific. The approaches listed will work for keeping athletes motivated and in the affiliate, though increases in fitness-related confidence can translate to confidence outside the walls of the affiliate. That said, someone with high self-efficacy in CrossFit training might have low self-efficacy in their ability to follow a nutrition plan. Or, an athlete might adhere well to the CrossFit program, but have low self-efficacy for a specific movement. Don’t just assume a high performer in one area will automatically perform well in another. You can use the sources of self-efficacy as a baseline for planning self-efficacy improvements in other areas.

With the current state of health in the U.S. and around the world, getting and keeping members in the affiliate is paramount. Performing constantly varied, functional movements, at high intensity and eating meat, vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, and no sugar at quantities that support exercise and not body fat is a simple approach to solving this complex problem. The affiliate owner and the coach have the fix at their fingertips. But in order to make the changes necessary to avoid chronic disease, or put it into remission, you need to make athletes believe in their abilities to accomplish  goals and continue to find ways to keep them in the gym. Setting up your gym to increase self-efficacy in the newer athlete is a great way to get your athletes to initiate healthy behaviors and create long-term adherence. Adherence to CrossFit is how we increase health, happiness, and performance. This is how we build resiliency.

About the Author

Michael Giardina started CrossFit in 2005. He has worked as a trainer at a CrossFit affiliate and as a CrossFit Seminar Staff Flowmaster and Content Supervisor. He has competed at the CrossFit Games and served as a CrossFit Games Head Judge. He is a Certified CrossFit Coach (CF-L4), has a Master of Science degree in exercise physiology, a Master of Public Health degree, and works as CrossFit’s Senior Manager of Health Education.