Risk Perception Influences Athletic Pacing Strategy.

PURPOSE: To examine risk-taking and risk-perception associations with perceived exertion, pacing and performance in athletes. METHODS: Two experiments were conducted in which risk-perception was assessed using the domain-specific risk-taking (DOSPERT) scale in 20 novice cyclists (Experiment 1) and 32 experienced ultra-marathon runners (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, participants predicted their pace and then performed a 5 km maximum effort cycling time-trial on a calibrated KingCycle mounted bicycle. Split-times and perceived exertion were recorded every kilometer. In experiment 2, each participant predicted their split times before running a 100 km ultra-marathon. Split-times and perceived exertion were recorded at 7 check-points. In both experiments, higher and lower risk-perception groups were created using median split of DOSPERT scores. RESULTS: In experiment 1, pace during the first km was faster among lower compared to higher risk-perceivers, t(18)=2.0 P=0.03, and faster among higher compared lower risk-takers, t(18)=2.2 P=0.02. Actual pace was slower than predicted pace during the first km in both the higher risk perceivers, t(9)=-4.2 P=0.001, and lower risk-perceivers, t(9)=-1.8 P=0.049. In experiment 2, pace during the first 36 km was faster among lower compared to higher risk-perceivers, t(16)=2.0 P=0.03. Irrespective of risk-perception group, actual pace was slower than predicted pace during the first 18 km, t(16)=8.9 P<0.001, and from 18 to 36 km, t(16)=4.0 P<0.001. In both experiments there was no difference in performance between higher and lower risk-perception groups. CONCLUSIONS: Initial pace is associated with an individual's perception of risk, with low perceptions of risk being associated with a faster starting pace. Large differences between predicted and actual pace suggests the performance template lacks accuracy, perhaps indicating greater reliance on momentary pacing decisions rather than pre-planned strategy.

A City's Toys: Theatre in Birmingham 1914-1918

This chapter provides a wide-ranging account of theatre in Birmingham, the UK’s second largest city. As a vital centre for the production of mass armaments and vehicles essential for the war effort, Birmingham was home to a rapidly expanding and socially diverse population. I show how theatres overcame wartime constraints to reflect that diversity with examples drawn from the popular entertainment provided by the city’s music halls, variety and melodrama theatres contrasted with the more decorous touring plays, musicals and spectacular home-grown pantomimes enjoyed at the prestigious Theatre Royal and Prince of Wales. The dogged attempts by the recently-established Birmingham Repertory Theatre to sustain an artistically and intellectually ambitious programme of new and classic drama also reveal a more complex response to the effects of war.

Higher Education - Border or Boundary? Can Theatre in Education Help Promote a University Education?

With the expansion and increased availability of Higher Education the progression to study for an undergraduate degree has been viewed as a simple stepping stone with examination success a straight - forward border pass. Changes in the funding of degree courses has established a series of more challenging boundaries to entry which demand a rigorous assessment of the benefits of Higher Education. The Widening Participation Unit at The University of Worcester has sought to ease this border crossing for pupils whose parents have not been to university. Their experience from previous projects was that school pupils more easily relate to undergraduate students whose experience of Higher Education is recent and relevant. With this in mind they commissioned the Drama and Performance Department to create a Theatre in Education programme that introduced an awareness of post sixteen options and future choices to challenge Higher Education stereotypes. As a result of this collaboration Why Bother? was created, directed by myself and devised and researched with four students who were studying drama. Their own experiences were used to inform the character development and dealt with worrying as a mature student about integration into full – time education, loss of income after working, the pressures of emotional commitments to partners and being away from home. The programme toured to two thousand year 9 – 11 pupils in Worcestershire and Herefordshire schools in January and May 2011. Devising and touring Why Bother provided students with an opportunity to work as a professional paid TIE team that it is not possible for them to do as part of their undergraduate degree course. My initial research looks at the effectiveness and limitations of this project based on pupil questionnaires and the experiences of the team which are explored within the broader context of TIE and its potential for affecting attitudinal change. This has given rise to a number of questions that need consideration in the development of a new TIE programme aimed at raising the awareness of sixth form students who are about to make the decision whether to apply to university or not. Collaboration with university students in exploring the value of an education that they have subscribed to raises issues of bias and whether their powers of persuasion actually prevent pupils from making their own individual decision. The ethics of promoting a “free” university education seem much less complex than the decision required now which involves balancing the real value against the high financial cost suggested in the working title of Is it Worth it? This paper will present my first attempts to develop research methods and methodologies that will enable me to evaluate the success of this and future TIE.