Experiencing Flow While Performing An Adventure Sport Adventure Sport Flow
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Authors
Carroll, Courtney
Issue Date
2004
Type
Thesis
Language
en
Keywords
Alternative Title
Abstract
The concept of flow, first proposed by Csikszentimihalyi (1974) investigates states of total involvement among a wide range of people and activities. In researching human happiness and motivation, the examination of flow in sport became an outgrowth of that larger research agenda. Flow is a concept employed to describe immersion and pleasured involvement in a task that is intrinsically rewarding. When a person has entered a state of flow, the experience itself is so enjoyable that the individual will strive to recreate it. Flow is a state being sought out by so many athletes because it is not a passive experience, it creates new performance standards by challenging skill levels in sports. Flow in sports is an optimal psychological state, representing those moments when everything comes together for an athlete's performance (Csikszentimihalyi, 1991). Flow lifts experience from the ordinary to the optimal, and it is in those moments that we feel truly alive and in tune with what we are doing (Jackson and Csikszentimihalyi, 1999).