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“The process of psychological counseling, not only in sports but in every field, is undergoing profound changes under the influence of the Fourth Industrial Revolution driven by the widespread use of the internet and social media. The development and use of smart products (smartphones), easy access to information (the internet), and the proliferation of social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok), which enable individuals and organizations to continuously share content, have had and continue to have a strong impact on the actions and mindset of individuals.
This is in line with what Stewart Brand had predicted: ‘You can try to change people’s minds, but you’re just wasting your time. Change the tools they have in their hands, and you’ll change the world.’ Therefore, the development of digitalization has led to the rise of continuous interconnection processes that are changing the daily lives and work of people, thanks to the rapid sharing of information. Today, there is the opportunity to work with a larger number of athletes because Facetime, WhatsApp, or Skype allow instant connections with any part of the world.
Through YouTube, you can download videos of athletes that you find useful for conducting counseling activities for almost any type of sport. You can receive videos of competitions recorded via smartphones and discuss them with your athletes or coaches. You can record specific relaxation, activation, or concentration exercises on your phone to be performed remotely. Regarding the use of complex psychological assessment systems, Robert Nideffer was an innovator when, at the beginning of the new millennium, he introduced the ability to administer the Attentive and Interpersonal Style Test, a complex questionnaire composed of 144 items and 19 scales, directly on the web, provide immediate scoring, and offer athletes/teams/coaches a detailed description of the results obtained compared to the specific reference population considered most suitable (there are about 20 different types just for sports).
Furthermore, the use of blogs, Twitter, and other social networks allows psychologists to directly disseminate the culture and knowledge of sports psychology, serving as a means of spreading ideas, innovations, areas of intervention, and the practice of this profession. Additionally, the internet allows one to learn about the education and activities of psychological consultants in the world of sports. Alessandro Baricco, in his book ‘The Game,’ argues that: ‘From a certain point onward (from the iPhone onwards, if I were to hazard a date), nothing had a serious chance of survival if it didn’t have the genetic heritage of video games in its DNA. I can even go so far as to stop, for the benefit of all, the genetic traits of that species destined to survive:
- Pleasing design capable of generating immediate satisfaction;
- A structure that can be reduced to the basic problem/solution pattern repeated multiple times;
- Short intervals between any problem and its solution;
- Progressive increase in game difficulty;
- Nonexistence and uselessness of immobility;
- Learning from the game and studying abstract instructions for use;
- Immediate usability without preamble;
- Reassuring display of a score after a certain number of moves.’
Psychological counseling in sports must reflect on these aspects and adopt some of these characteristics if it wants to remain appealing to the new generations of athletes and coaches. Today, the quality of work is perceived by athletes in terms of the time it takes between a problem and its solution, psychological skills are learned through practice and must be immediately usable, performance (the score, in Baricco’s words) must show a clear improvement, and learning should not happen through the professional’s study but through practical situations and immediately accessible tools. Sports psychologists will need to increasingly align their work with these principles if they want to establish themselves in the sports professions market.”
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