Sports Psychology: Mental Performance & Motivation

• Practice goal setting, self-talk, visualization, and focus routines

• Analyze athlete videos and map factors affecting performance

• Complete pressure, teamwork, and emotional-regulation challenges

• Evaluate wearables and performance data for value and ethical risk

• Respond to athlete identity, branding, and media-pressure cases

• Design and present an athlete-centered mental-performance plan

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

• Explain how psychological, social, and environmental factors influence performance

• Apply evidence-based mental skills to athlete cases and high-pressure situations

• Evaluate a performance plan using the athlete’s needs and measures of progress

You’ll leave with your team’s consultant plan and a certificate of completion.

Mental-performance skills give students a structured way to examine what happens before, during, and after a demanding moment. Goal setting clarifies what can be controlled. Self-talk and visualization exercises show how preparation affects attention. Recovery planning connects sustained performance to sleep, stress, and emotional regulation.

The consultant framework adds disciplined reasoning. Students must identify a challenge, explain why it may be happening, recommend a specific response, and decide how success would be measured. Team cases strengthen listening and communication because an athlete’s needs cannot be reduced to one statistic. These skills transfer to academics, performing arts, leadership, and other high-pressure settings as well as sport.

For students who have completed 9th, 10th, 11th, or 12th grade.

A great performance one day, a struggle the next: if that difference makes you curious, this course looks at the person behind the result. Sport, psychology, health, technology, and media all offer ways into the question. Mental-skills practice and team cases let you explore how people support improvement, including roles beyond competition and coaching.

You don’t need to compete at a high level or plan to become a professional athlete. Pressure and wellbeing are part of the discussion.

Based on students surveyed in Summer Discovery’s 2026 UCLA high school program.

UCLA gives high-school students the opportunity to explore an academic interest while experiencing university life in Los Angeles, a city where entertainment, technology, business, science, and culture constantly intersect. The campus has its own community and rhythm while connecting students to a wider environment built around creativity and new ideas.

Students learn alongside peers, navigate a large campus, and gain independence through everyday choices and responsibilities. Time outside class expands the experience through friendships, campus life, and opportunities to notice which subjects and settings hold their attention. For families, UCLA offers a valuable combination of substantive academics, personal growth, and clearer direction about what a student may want to study, experience more deeply, or pursue next.