Public Speaking Anxiety (PSA) arises from the real or anticipated performance of an oral presentation. People with PSA experience an increase in Heart Rate (HR), negative self- focused thoughts and observable behaviours such as, trembling or non-fluent speech. In this study Video Self-Modelling (VSM), an intervention based on observational learning, was used to increase performance fluency and decrease cognitive, behavioural, and physiological anxiety. Ten high school students with high PSA participated from an English class in a New Zealand school. Video self-models were created for each student through editing to depict confident speaking and then viewed by the students 5 to 8 times over a fortnight. Results indicated from pre-intervention to post-intervention that all students decreased their level of behavioural anxiety. Seven of the ten students decreased their level of self-reported speech anxiety and six students self-reported more positive thoughts about public speaking. There was a decrease in HR for two of the four students, who wore HR monitors during the study.
These results suggest that VSM could be used as an intervention, within a high school setting, to reduce anxiety and improve public speaking performance.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:canterbury.ac.nz/oai:ir.canterbury.ac.nz:10092/8199 |
| Date | January 2013 |
| Creators | Gilchrist, Elizabeth Marie Cleland |
| Publisher | University of Canterbury. School of Health Sciences |
| Source Sets | University of Canterbury |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic thesis or dissertation, Text |
| Rights | Copyright Elizabeth Marie Cleland Gilchrist, http://library.canterbury.ac.nz/thesis/etheses_copyright.shtml |
| Relation | NZCU |
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