With connections to aerospace, military operations, athletics, medicine, and other physically demanding industries, the University of Florida is at the forefront of research and training in sport psychology and human performance. This specialization prepares you to support a wide range of clients who work in high-pressure scenarios, from young athletes to experienced surgeons.
Through a targeted 12-credit curriculum, you will explore key psychological topics such as motivation, cognition, emotion, learning, and group dynamics. In addition, you’ll learn to implement practical, evidence-based intervention that help performers maintain focus, build resilience, and maximize their potential.
An M.S. in APK with a specialization in Sport Psychology and Elite Performance positions you for success in sport coaching, mental performance consulting, skill development programming, and related fields.
Through this track, you will develop your expertise in:
- Psychological Aspects of Performance
- Motor Skills
- Physically and Mentally Demanding Environments
- Performance Enhancement Strategies
- Neurophysiology
- Coaching and Skill Acquisition
Specialization Courses (12 credits)
Fundamentals in Behavioral Aspects of Performance
This course reviews principles of motor skill development as well as conditions affecting motor skill development and retention in physical education activities.
This course is part of a two-course series in tandem with APK 5404 Sport Psychology. The courses collectively examine the cognitive, social, behavioral, and neurophysiological factors that influence performance in sport and other motor performance endeavors. Specific topics covered in APK6408 include examining how psychological factors and psychological skills training programs can be leveraged to enhance performance from the perspectives of youth sport, expertise development, practice structure, diversity, leadership, teams, athlete burnout, athlete coping, and athlete transition.
The field of sport psychology actively promotes the scientist-practitioner model. Utilization of the scientist-practitioner model involves the ability to consume and appropriately apply contemporary theory and scientific findings to the practice of applied sport psychology. Accordingly, this course will explore how science and theory inform practical application of psychological skills interventions.
This course surveys the cognitive, social, behavioral, and neurophysiological factors that influence performance in sport and other motor performance endeavors. Topics covered include examining how motivation, emotion, attention, performance attributions, confidence, and psychological consequences of injury influence performance; how psychological skills training programs that develop skills in goal setting, emotion regulation, attentional focus, attributions, self-efficacy, self-talk, and mental imagery influence performance; and how skills are acquired, expertise is developed, and practice structures can leverage the mechanisms of human learning to facilitate optimal skill acquisition.
Covers skill acquisition and expertise development in human performance with specific coverage of the role that perceptual, cognitive, and motor (movement) skills are necessary and trainable aspects of human expertise. This course links the theory of human learning with the practice of scientifically informed approaches to teaching, coaching, and skill development facilitation across myriad domains of human performance.
