Associate professor, Ph.D. N.S. Niyasova
Siberian State University of Physical Culture and Sport, Omsk

Keywords: individual needs, athlete's mental activity, need cycle.

Introduction. The problem of individual needs displayed during competition is being studied in sports science, but it is important not only to update and meet the individual needs, but also purposefully manage the development of athletes at different stages of mental conditioning. It is important in the development of individual sports needs to resolve the contradiction between the need to update professionally important sports needs and the lack of knowledge about the structure of the need cycle, clarifying the sequence or simultaneousness in meeting them, that is changing from one need state to another. Thus, thanks to allocated conceptual foundations of development of individual needs during sports occupations practitioners can effectively manage athlete's mental activity, resulting in higher sports achievements by meeting his current needs.

The purpose of the research was to prove theoretically the conceptual foundations of individual needs, revealing the structure of the need cycle and clarifying the human need state when doing sports.

Methods and organization of the research included analysis and generalization of scientific literature; theoretical research; study of documents and results of training in specific sports; analysis of result cards with a view of studying personal sports achievements (5 basketball matches); methodology for ranking 33 statements to define the process of development of 12 needs that are important in professional sport, including assessment of the hierarchical system of individual needs, updating methods for them, degree of satisfaction (in points); methodology for subjective evaluation of intensity of emotional experiences by scaling (from -10 to +10 points). Mathematical methods of statistics were used for data processing.  

The theoretical research included analysis and synthesis of works of national and foreign scholars on the studied topic; over 150 works on biology, sports physiology, personality psychology, sports psychology and sports theory were studied. Basketball players aged 16-17 years had their personal result cards analyzed and were surveyed during 5 games held daily; the intensity of emotional experiences was monitored after each period, during halftimes.

Results and discussion. Conceptual frameworks of development of individual needs in sports activity were substantiated with regard to the analysis and generalization of scientific literature and theoretical research.

First. The development of an individual need is an irreversible, targeted and regular change of the need state of a person caused by a set of physiological processes in the body and sensuous processes of mental activity that are periodically manifested in internal and external sensations reflecting the functioning of organs and body systems.

The development of an individual need includes need states that are manifested in succession and slip into one another: 1) a state of actualization of the need; 2) a state of satisfying the need; 3) a state of decay of the satisfied need; 4) a state of transition. Updating of individual needs is traced in the sensory input (in the form of spontaneous thoughts, mental images, concepts of space, time perception, muscular effort sensations) and its satisfaction – in particular actions or movements of an individual reflecting the space-temporal and strength characteristics. Specific motivation and specific movement of a subject as sources of the need cycle contribute to continuous development of individual needs at sports classes.  

Need cycle is a complex of interrelated physiological and psychological processes that form a complete circle of development of an individual need. The structure of the need cycle consists of a need state (we understand it as internal and external sensations) of specific motivation (an individual choice of the method of updating the need) and specific movement (activity of an individual influencing the satisfaction degree of the need).

The sequence of the moments of changing the need state involved in one or another circuit circle of the need cycle, naturally associated with the physiological laws of the body function and mental laws of sensitivity development, is never broken and is carried out in the following order.  

1.  State of actualization of the need. This need state is characterized as negative suffering. It is an organic sensation that is rooted in the inactivity of some organ and manifests itself before an appearance of a corresponding object. In case of negative suffering of an unsatisfied need external sensations are lacking, but they are replaced by other (internal) ones. These include spontaneous thoughts, mental images, concepts of space, time perception, muscular effort sensations [2, 8, 9].

 A search for an object and motivation to bring the object necessary for interaction closer to oneself are characteristic of the moment of actualization of the need. The basic movement when the need is updated is a movement aimed at reaching the object. Experienced emotions are frustration and deprivation; they cause internal changes in the body, usually related to adaptation to the environment.   

2.  State of satisfying the need. This need state is characterized as positive pleasure that manifests itself in activity of an individual trying to bring the object even closer. It is important to note that at first needs satisfaction causes some unpleasant organic sensations, since the resources of the body are spent to the maximum, but these organic sensations give way to the predominantly external sensations the body has been lacking, and at the same time a period of positive pleasure starts. Movement aims at keeping the object at one’s disposal while interaction with it is pleasant. Experienced emotions are satisfaction, enjoyment, work.

3.  State of decline of the satisfied need. This need state is characterized as positive suffering. When resources expenditure while working has reached its maximum and the period of peak pleasure is over, then the same sensation that used to be pleasant becomes sore –positive suffering is in place [5-7]. This is related to the desire to remove the object, already unwanted, and the manifestation of experienced emotions – fatigue and exhaustion. Movement aims at removing the object or moving away from it.  

4. State of transition. This need state is characterized as negative pleasure. Finally, when exhaustion has reached extreme limits, work, and at the same time external sensations accompanying it, are terminated, and negative pleasure is in place due to rest and resources recovery. If we regard negative pleasure as an organic sensation accompanying recovery of the spent energy upon termination of the interaction with the object, then the subjects of the negative pleasure are again other sensations, and, moreover, they are again organic or internal, corresponding to the very same organic sensations that caused the negative suffering. The final point of the individual need development is characterized by a desire to prolong the state of rest and the recovery process. This point is characteristic of movement aimed at continuing and even increasing the quiet inactivity of an organ or the whole body.

Second. The development of an individual need at sports classes is a comprehensive system of psychophysiological activity in which the processes of updating, satisfying, decline and transition can take place sequentially or simultaneously. It should be noted that the principle of consistency was already partially described by A.G. Maslow [3], but his needs hierarchy theory describing the sequential rise of the needs of the first, second, third, etc. order does not explain the mechanism of their satisfaction, leaving open the following question: “How are biological needs satisfied and why is it only after their satisfaction that social needs can be updated?” This contradiction can be resolved if we refer to the structure of the need cycle created on the basis of the unity of physiological laws of functioning of the body discovered by P.K. Anokhin [1] and mental patterns of development of sensitivity described by V.K. Vilunas [4].

The principle of simultaneity was detected in our research based on the results of the survey of athletes, the information on their emotional experiences, generalized personal achievements in competitive conditions and analysis of the results of training in specific sports. The results of the survey of athletes and teacher observation of sports achievements showed that the actualization of the second-order needs determines the satisfaction of the first-order ones. For example, there is experimental data obtained in which the mental process of the actualization of the need for specific movements of a chosen sport or the need for specific sports knowledge (second-order needs) take place simultaneously with the process of satisfying the need for movement sensations (first-order needs). Thus, the process of actualization of the second-order needs determines the satisfaction of the first-order needs. This made it possible to discover the mechanism of subjection of the needs to achievement of sports goals that explains the simultaneity of this process.  

Conclusions

1. Theoretically substantiated conceptual basics of development of individual needs revealing the structure of the need cycle and explaining the need state contribute to the management of human mental activity in competitive conditions.

2. The developed framework of the need cycle based on the physiological laws of functioning of the body and mental patterns of sensations explains the succession of transition of one need state of an individual into another, which contributes to an increase of the effectiveness of development of individual needs in sport.

3. The leading idea in the detected principle of simultaneity of satisfaction of individual needs at sports classes is in the importance of actualization of professionally important second-order needs in sport that determine the satisfaction of the individual first-order needs.

References

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Corresponding author: aikin-va@yandex.ru