ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to summarize the literature on mental skills and athletes with disabilities and offers specific suggestions for applied practitioners working in the field. The rationale for Psychological skills training (PST) is based on an assumption that an athlete’s negative thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations can hinder peak performance and that mental strategies can be used to enhance optimal performance. Mindfulness-based interventions have been conducted with various populations, ranging from people with chronic pain to cancer to those with cardiovascular disease. Applied work within disability sport has focused primarily on practical considerations when delivering PST programs to athletes with disabilities. Athletes and coaches of high-performance disability sports value the use of mental skills. Research examining the effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions is growing, albeit with able-bodied athletes. Sport psychologists working with all athletes discover the idiosyncratic strengths and weaknesses they possess. In disability sport athletes are “classified” or graded based on their ability to perform various physical tests.
