Flow in Sport, Exercise, and Performance: A Review with Implications for Future Research

Abstract

The broad definition of flow is a person's sense of joy, creativity and an experience of total involvement in life. Such an experience fosters the development of a conscious state where optimal human functioning flourishes (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). Qualitative and quantitative research on the topic has led to a definition of flow that includes nine sub-experiences that constitute the conscious state of flow. While based on the nine components of flow, often flow reflects a diverse experience based on the person's level of ability (expert vs. amateur), activity, and cultural background. Research within the area of flow and its applications is still young. Several areas within flow research need further exploration. This systematic review provides an in depth discussion of the theoretical foundations of flow, current research, and recommendations for expanding flow theory and research. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]

Headnote

Abstract

The broad definition of flow is a person's sense of joy, creativity and an experience of total involvement in life. Such an experience fosters the development of a conscious state where optimal human functioning flourishes (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). Qualitative and quantitative research on the topic has led to a definition of flow that includes nine sub-experiences that constitute the conscious state of flow. While based on the nine components of flow, often flow reflects a diverse experience based on the person's level of ability (expert vs. amateur), activity, and cultural background. Research within the area of flow and its applications is still young. Several areas within flow research need further exploration. This systematic review provides an in depth discussion of the theoretical foundations of flow, current research, and recommendations for expanding flow theory and research.

Keywords: Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, engagement, flow theory, sport psychology

Introduction

Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi developed the construct of flow from his early work on the effects of anxiety and boredom on task absorption. He describes flow as a concept that defines the full ranges of optimal human functioning. The broad definition of flow is a person's sense of joy, creativity, and an experience of total involvement in life. Such an experience fosters the development of a conscious state where optimal human functioning flourishes (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). This concept has served as a beginning point for a body of research on flow and has fostered a more in depth understanding of flow achievement, and the individual experiential factors present when a person is experiencing flow.

Early Perspectives on Flow

The study of flow began in the early 1970s at the University of Chicago with the work of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. His work began the process of investigating optimal human functioning by examining participants' descriptive narrative of the experience. Csikszentmihalyi sought to understand the specific aspects of the human experience most commonly expressed among people who displayed adept skills and abilities in their field in order to better understand the specific domains of high performance (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). From in-depth interviews, Csikszentmihalyi developed the nine domains of flow with findings published in his 1990 work titled, Flow. Susan Jackson elaborated on these nine domains in her doctoral studies and early work in which she studied elite athletes' experience of flow and performed qualitative content analysis on their descriptions. Since her early work, Jackson has dedicated her career to studying flow in elite athletes. Jackson points out the nine domains of flow "Together...represent the optimal psychological state of flow; singly they signify conceptual elements of this state" (Jackson & Eklund, 2002, p. 134). Important to the concept of flow is that at no time are we able to truly measure flow; instead, we are able to measure only the psychological experiences indicative of (and correlated to) the flow state. The following descriptions of the flow domains (see below) are from Csikszentmihalyi's 1990 work, Flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990), and Jackson and Csikszentmihalyi's combined undertaking, Flow in Sports (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Defining Flow

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi first coined flow, colloquially known as one's ability to "get into the zone." Specifically, flow is athletes' full engagement in their athletic performance that involves an ideal balance among focus, enjoyment, the challenges of the competitive situation, and the athlete's skills. Athletes attempt to find this harmonious balance during competitive performance whereby the athlete or performer's mind and body are engaging the competitive event with seemingly automatic, correct, and autotelic response.

According to Csikszentmihalyi (1990), flow is a cognitive state that involves athletes enjoying and focusing on their athletic performance (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999). Athletes being fully absorbed in their activity characterizes focus (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999). Focused athletes are ones who can mute irrelevant external as well as internal distractions, allowing them to concentrate on the competitive task. According to Yerkes and Dodson (1908), the components of flow mediating the achievement of optimal levels of arousal and attention as well as an athlete's emotional state during competition characterizes such focus.

Athletes who focus during their competitive performance are ones who are fully concentrating on the physical and mental tasks required to perform at their best. Such focus is necessary for optimal performance. In comparison, a "harmonious experience" (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999) that results in an athlete who reports a positive, euphoric, and intrinsically motivating experience characterizes enjoyment. Anyone engaged in a performance situation can experiences flow; however, according to flow theory, sport provides individuals more positive experiences, thus, more opportunities to achieve flow (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Flow involves nine components: challenge-skills balance, merging of action-awareness, clear goals, feedback, concentration, sense of control, loss of self-consciousness, transformation of time, and autotelic experience. Optimizing all nine components during a single activity can create an optimal state of arousal (Yerkes & Dodson, 1908), thus positively affecting performance.

Challenge-skills balance refers to the need for individuals to have a balance between their current competitive situation and perceived skill level; this 'balance' is where the challenges of the situation match the skills of the athletes for whom these challenges and skills are at a personally high level (Williams, 2009), positively affecting performance. Moreover, challenges are the situational demands of the event that provide an opportunity for action, with skills being people's perceived level of confidence and belief in their ability (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999). In order to reach a balance between challenges and skills, one's challenges and skills must be well-matched, relatively high, and go beyond the person's average skill levels (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Furthermore, this component is essential to experiencing flow as athletes must feel their current skill level matches the competitive demands (Jackson & Csikzentmihalyi, 1999), or such negative moods as boredom (having high skills and low challenge), anxiety (having low skills and high challenge), or apathy (having low skill and low challenge) could arise. Moreover, an athlete's perceived skills are necessary to match the presenting challenges of the competitive event, possibly before the latter eight components can be maximized. Understanding the role of challenge skills balance is important in considering an athlete's ability to access and maintain a flow state. If individuals do not sense a balance between the foreseeable challenge and their perceived skills, the inequality will generate anxiety within the athletes, prohibiting them from fully utilizing the eight remaining components of flow. A second component of flow, the merging of action-awareness, refers to the merging of one's actions and awareness during performance; such integration of conscious action and awareness of that athlete's action causes the individual's movements to feel effortless.

Action-awareness merging is the fusion of effort and awareness of that effort during an activity, thus creating a moment whereby the 'feeling' of doing is lost and the feeling of automatic response takes place. The athlete is no longer thinking of the "hows" of performing and just doing.

Clear goals refers to having a clear set of strategies, instructions, or goals when engaging in the activity. Clear goals allow athletes to evaluate the progress of their actions through the automatic assessment of their progress toward their specific goals.

Unambiguous feedback refers to the automatic receipt of information from various sources during the activity that positively affects performance. This information or feedback allows the participants to make any necessary adjustments to their form or performance through automatic response (not self-conscious or forced). Unambiguous feedback describes a performer needing to receive accurate feedback during the event, promotes skill development. Sources of feedback are the coach, team, competitive situation, opposing team as well as the individual (i.e., feeling the movement of the body); these forms of feedback assist the athlete in gauging their performance and making appropriate adjustments during the competitive event (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Concentration refers to complete concentration on the task or event. A lack of concentration can cause poor decisions, distraction, and focus on irrelevant situational variables that will not assist in achieving flow or produce a desirable competitive outcome. When optimizing this component the athletes mute irrelevant stimuli and distractions and are fully focused on their course of action.

Sense of control is a paradoxical notion that refers to the athlete feeling in control, but not consumed by the evaluation of it (Stavrou, Jackson, Zervas, & Karteroliotis, 2007). Sense of Control suggests that athletes relinquish control of their skill in order to feel in control; when athletes are hyper-vigilant during competition this may cause the athletes to over-analyze their performance, affecting the achievement of flow. However, the athlete's performance becomes automatic when athletes assume their skills are stable, effective, and reflexive, allowing their skill to match the challenge naturally. Further, a sense of control is the feeling of effortlessness that occurs during the merging of action and awareness (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Loss of self-consciousness is focusing on the skill but not its evaluation (Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999). In order to optimize performance, self-conscious thoughts (over evaluation of one's actions) regarding the nature of the performance must be eliminated, resulting in a performer who is fully absorbed, yet freely engaged in the activity. The performers release feelings of the ego (e.g., "is this movement correct" or "am I doing a good job") and come to understand what their role is in the activity. Gayle Privette (1983) describes this feeling of selfawareness as "clarity of role."

Transformation of time refers to the feeling during the activity that time has transformed beyond physical awareness. Athletes report the feeling that time has either sped up or slowed down. When in this state, athletes have reported that, as their behaviors felt slowed, the overall course of the event seemed to speed by.

Autotelic experience refers to experiencing intrinsic reward and pleasure during a flow state; when an individual has experienced flow, he or she feels enjoyment and intrinsic reward from participating in the activity Qackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999).

Measuring Flow

Much of the early assessment of flow focused on the use of semi-structured interviews to investigate what specific aspects of flow people commonly experienced, regardless of the activity they were performing or their cultural background (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975). This approach was refined into the Experience Sampling Method (ESM), which Csikszentmihalyi and others used to gain a snapshot of people's experience of flow while they were experiencing it over the course of a week in their daily work or athletic activities. When a pager cued them, participants would document their experience of flow.

The present research found ESM to be not only a valuable tool for gaining insight into an individual's inner experiences but also a valid tool for comparing the psychological experiences that comprise flow among groups of people (Csikszentmihalyi & Larson, 1987). The development of the ESM shed a great deal of light onto the nature of flow and how individuals experience it across a wide range of activities. Later, Jackson and colleagues addressed the issue of developing an empirically valid measure for flow and developed the Flow State Scale (FSS) and the Dispositional Flow Scale (DFS) (Jackson & Marsh, 1996).

The Flow States Scales

The flow scales are a series of scales that assess the extent to which situational or dispositional factors influence individual flow achievement during activity. Susan Jackson developed the Dispositional Flow Scale (DFS), which tests the trait component to flow (Jackson & Eklund, 2004) through examining dispositional factors that influence individual flow during competition. In comparison, the Flow States Scale (FSS), which Susan Jackson developed, tests the state component to flow (Jackson & Eklund, 2004) through examining situational factors that influence individual levels of flow during competition.

The long versions of both the FSS-2 and DFS-2 have 36 items and measure state and trait flow along nine subscales based on the nine components of flow (i.e., challenge-skill balance, action-awareness, clear goals, unambiguous feedback, sense of control, loss of self-consciousness, concentration on the task at hand, transformation of time, and autotelic experience).

Stavrou et al. (2007) found the FSS had reasonable reliability regarding its correlations between flow subscales, the orthogonal model of flow, and assessment of challenge and skills in athletes. Additionally, Jackson and Marsh found considerable reliability and validity with both the Flow States Scale-2 (FSS-2) and Dispositional Flow Scale-2 (DFS-2). Jackson and Eklund (2004) further support this in their publication of the flow manual. According to Jackson and Eklund (2004), the FSS-2 and the DFS-2 use a five point Likert Scale. They designed the FSS-2 for researchers to administrate them to participants (e.g., exercisers, athletes, hobbyists, and performers) soon after completing an athletic event or non-athletic task to assess a participant's just-completed experience, while Jackson and Eklund designed the DFS-2 for researchers to administrate it to participants at any time and for sport and exercise psychology professionals (e.g., researchers and practitioners) to use to identify one's propensity to experience flow in a more or less stable way while engaging in a particular activity (Jackson & Eklund, 2004).

Jackson (2009a, 2009b) developed more recent versions of the FSS-2 and DFS-2, and these are short forms of each scale. The Short Flow States Scale-2 (Short FSS-2; Jackson, 2009b) is a nine-item questionnaire assessing the state component of flow on a five-point Likert scale with response items from 1 "strongly disagree" to 5 "strongly agree."

Though one's cultural origin, one's chosen discipline, and linguistic factors could affect one's description of the flow state, researchers have found flow is a highly cross culturally sound concept and the theoretical foundation of flow as an altered conscious state appears to be accepted across a wide range of cultures. Research has confirmed the flow measures are crossculturally valid tools to assess the construct of flow, and revisions from the first to second versions of the scales have increased the conceptual coherence to Csikszentmihalyi's original nine-factor conceptualization of flow while being tested on participants with expertise in a large range of sports and sporting activities (Jackson & Eklund, 2002). Jackson and colleagues, as well as a large and growing body of flow researchers, have used these scales in the assessment of athletes who play a wide range of sports, as well as non-athletes. Some of the activities the flow scales assess include the following: gymnastics, track and field, distance running, triathlon, rugby, rowing, white water rafting, cycling, swimming, hockey, figure skating, sailing, rowing, gaming, motorcycle riding, dancing, farming, hiking, horseback riding, fishing, piano playing, singing, writing, web browsing, and military combat (Chen, 2000; Freer, 2009; Harari, 2008; Hefferon & Ollis, 2006; Kiili, 2006; Levine, 2006; Manzano, Theorell, Harmat, & Ullen, 2010; Whitmore, 2005). Additionally, the flow scales have assessed the experience of flow in a range of nations and cultures including the following: Australia, many European countries, Japan, Korea, North America, China, and Thailand (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988; Kawabata, Mallett, & Jackson, 2008; Yuan, Hu, & Wang, 2009).

Translations of the Flow States Scales

Translations of the flow scales have also emerged as highly cross-culturally valid measures when translated into other languages. The flow scales have also been found to maintain their sound psychometric properties when successfully translated into other languages, including: Greek, French, Japanese, and Chinese (Fournier, Gaudreau, Demontrond-Behr, Visioli, Forest, & Jackson, 2007; Kawabata et al., 2008; Stavrou & Zervas, 2004; Yuan, Hu, & Wang, 2009). Some translations of the flow scales have found small discrepancies with construct validity. But, further research into both the cultural validity of the flow state as a human experience, as well as the internal consistency of the flow measures, have found flow to be both a cross-culturally valid concept. This cross-cultural research has confirmed the flow instruments accurately measure the psychological states associated with the flow experience (Jackson & Eklund, 2002).

Seemingly, the only caveat to findings suggesting flow is a cross-culturally valid concept, and empirically valid in cross-lingual translations findings Doganis, Iosifidou, and Vlachopoulus (2000) mentioned findings in investigating the Greek translations of the flow scales. This work found the original versions of the flow scales to lack significant levels of internal consistency on certain scales (Doganis, Iosifidou, & Vlachopoulus, 2000). Those scales were the "actionawareness merging" and "concentration on the task at hand" domains of flow. Based on these findings, the authors suggested Jackson and colleagues further clarify the conceptual underpinnings of those domains, which likely would aid in their translation to other languages.

Cultural Variations in Measuring Flow

Doganis et al. (2000) reiterated the warnings of Jackson and Marsh (1996) in using the flow scales to assess a particular population because of issues related to linguistic translation and nuances of dialectical expression. Additionally, the authors suggested there could be variances in responding when using the FSS to assess an athlete after a competitive experience because of the effect winning and losing can have on flow reporting. But Doganis et al. (2000) went on to suggest variance due to competitive outcome is likely nominal and an inherent part of the competitive experience given that all athletes experience both winning and losing in some ratio relative to their skills and experience of success in competition. Their research also discussed possible issues with the flow scales related to using them with a particular population of athletes who may characterize their flow experiences in a particular vernacular that is specific to their sport and does not fit with the nomenclature of the flow scales (Doganis et al., 2000). Jackson and colleagues addressed these issues in their 2002 work by increasing the conceptual coherence of the flow scales to the original conceptual underpinning of Dr. Csikszentmihalyi (1990) when redesigning the flow scales into the FSS-2 and DFS-2.

Flow, Peak Experience, and Peak Performance

Peak experience is a transcendental, spontaneous, and joyful event that absorbs the individual into its moment. Abraham Maslow (1968) suggested that peak experiences are vital elements in an individual's quest for self-actualization; such a moment provides an optimal state of consciousness as well as experience. Privette (1983) suggests that the 'self is more passive due to the spontaneous nature of a peak experience and this passive 'self allows the 'self to be absorbed in the moment, rather than in the pursuit of any action (during the moment). Individuals that experience this peak moment tend to report feelings of completion or closure as the experience may redefine, finalize, or reframe certain feelings of progress or stagnation.

Peak performance is the experience of superior performance during an activity (Privette, 1983). Peak performance is maximizing one's ability; thus, feelings of progress and superiority are felt. Peak performance differs from peak experience in that peak performance tends to be more focused, intentional (not spontaneous), and responsive to the activity. Meaning, athletes are responding to the demands of the competitive event with their skills, instead of passively experiencing the competition without action. There is a strong sense of self and selfunderstanding during this moment, as the participants understand their ability, motivations for participation, and are often seeking to optimize performance for a personal or extrinsic outcome.

In comparison, Csikszentmihalyi (1990) defines flow as an intrinsically motivating and joyful experience. According to Privette (1983), often flow is the subject of discussion in relation to peak performance, whereby such a pairing suggests that the experience of flow is contingent on a peak performance (or vice versa). This assumption is often the subject of debate within the area of sport psychology: Peak performance is superior or best ability that is not exclusively comprised of intrinsic motivation and joy (as a product). An athlete could have experienced a peak performance without the feelings of deep enjoyment or intrinsic motivation. In comparison, experiencing flow is not dependent on athletes feeling as though they are maximizing their current ability. Regarding the self during flow, the self experiences a loss of ego and role clarity; negative emotions associated with the over-evaluation of performance (i.e., anxiety or frustration) are suppressed. This suppression of self-conscious thought permits the performers to come to a sense of deep awareness regarding their placement and function within the activity. Moreover, an understanding of the process becomes more fluid to which once experienced (flow) the participant feels motivated to continue.

Personal interactions play a vital role in the flow experience. When considering the components of challenge-skills balance, feedback, and clear goals, it is evident that interactions with others could directly affect the optimization of these components. Feedback, as previously defined, provides the participant with an unobstructed understanding of the need to alter or engage certain skills. Feedback can come from multiple sources such as coaches, teammates, spectators, as well as the athlete's own body (e.g., kinesthetic feedback). Appropriate forms of information that guide the athlete during performance (thus eliminating self-conscious thought) certainly would open the door to the flow experience. However, such negative sources of feedback such as negative comments, behaviors, or remarks from spectators, lack of communication on the team or with the coach, can hinder athletes' ability to make adequate adjustments to their play, thus hindering flow achievement.

Second is the element of challenge-skills balance, which is the athlete feeling that his or her skills are well-matched for the competitive event. Stavrou et al. (2007) explored the role of challenge-skills balance and the orthogonal model of flow on its relationship to flow achievement. The researchers found that persons who scored high on the flow scales also scored high on the 'skills' subscale in the challenge measure. Such a finding suggests that athletes must feel able to engage a competitive setting at their current skill level (or possess the ability to increase their skills) in order to achieve flow. Such findings do not discount the notion of 'challenges,' as challenge is an essential component in minimizing feelings of boredom or apathy in order to achieve flow but do highlight the importance of athletes' subjective evaluation of their current ability.

Interestingly, this study expands the theory of flow in that not only are the perceptions of skills possibly slightly more important that the challenge of the event, but research highlighting skill perception can be explored. Moreover, good training and communication within the team regarding what the athletes can offer to the competition are variables that affect the athletes' subjective measure of their performance.

Last, the flow component of clear goals refers to the participants having structured goals regarding their participation in the performance. Coaches, teammates, or parents affect the maintenance and development of clear goals. Having clear goals when entering the activity allows athletes to enter the competition focused on only the necessary actions pertaining to that activity. Unfortunately, a team, coach, or parent who does not clearly communicate goals to the athlete may create feelings of confusion or self-consciousness regarding the athletes' ability to effectively monitor their behaviors and actions during the event as well as perform at their peak.

Implications: Future Directions for Flow Research

Research within the area of flow and its applications is still young. There are several areas within flow research that researchers can explore and develop.

The Autotelic Experience

New findings (River, 2011) would seem to support the findings of Schüler (2010), which suggested the motivational structure of the autotelic experience is more complex than previously considered. In her work, Schüler (2010) questioned the classical model of flow theory as it pertains to the motivational structure of the autotelic experience. Schüler's work suggested the sequencing of extrinsic and intrinsic motivational structures is a key aspect of the autotelic experience. It would appear that further work is necessary to elaborate on the importance of reconsidering a reordering of motivational structures in the autotelic experience as it pertains to high performance.

Schüler's work (2010) pointed to a reordering of the intrinsic and extrinsic motivational structures in such a way that still favors intrinsic experiences in the flow state, but only slightly. Her findings pointed to an increased importance of extrinsic experiences than previously considered in theoretical models of flow and the autotelic experience. Schiller's research suggested a shift in emphasis onto extrinsic motivational structures that are present-based. These present-based extrinsic motivational structures serve to highlight important environmental cues that aid in fully appraising and utilizing competitive opportunities as they appear moment to moment. River's (2011) findings suggest the autotelic experience is actually a primarily extrinsically motivated construct among higher performing squash athletes, with intrinsic motivational rewards existing in a secondary relationship. This switching of motivational emphases fosters a new view of the autotelic experience.

Important in this new conceptualization is the defining of extrinsic goals that are primarily present-oriented and not outcome oriented. From this perspective, engaging in present based extrinsic rewards is significantly more motivating for higher performing athletes because of the opportunity it presents to enact micro-competitive behaviors from moment to moment that permit athletes to actively cultivate victory.

Music and Flow

Pates, Karageorghis, Fryer, & Maynard (2003) suggested that music and flow can have a positive relationship on performance with Karageorghis and Deeth (2002) finding that asynchronous motivational music correlated to higher flow states within study participants. As Pates et al. (2003) found, participants suggested that the asynchronous music assisted in increasing concentration and relaxation as well as participants experienced more positive emotions.

Flow, Peak Experience, and Peak Performance

Flow is not synonymous with peak experience (Privette, 1983) whereby researching the similar, potentially parallel experiences of flow and peak experiences in athletes would be of considerable interest. Also, research exploring the intersection of flow, peak performance, and peak experience or the potential triggering of one experience to another (Jackson & Roberts, 1992; Privette, 1983; Privette & Bundrick, 1997) is still to be examined.

Flow and Work

The experience of flow within work, leisure, and interpersonal settings has vast implications. In essence, flow is a fluid intersection of enjoyment (Moneta & Csikszentmihalyi, 1996), absorption (Chen, 2006, Csikszentmihalyi, 1975; Sanchez et al., 2011), and intrinsic experience (Moneta & Csikszentmihalyi, 1996). Researching the relationship among these three constructs within the domains of physical activity, interpersonal relationships, and work would add to the current understanding of flow. Sanchez et al. (2011) found that flow was least experienced in non-healthy (burnt out) individuals, postulating that the cause of this is that burnout contradicts the inherent experience of engagement necessary to achieving flow. Further research exploring the experience of flow in physically and mentally 'healthy' versus non-healthy adults (Sanchez et al., 2011) would provide more insight into (1) the fluid experience of flow, (2) the intersection of emotions and flow, and (3) assist in further operationalizing the flow model.

Flow in Combat

Harari (2008) postulated that the experience of flow within combat situations involves a loss of reflective awareness, necessity to focus on the present as a means of survival, and such present focus results in an increased awareness of living; Harari suggested that the flight response activated during wartime or combat situations optimizes all flow components out of necessity. Certainly for the soldier in a wartime situation, elements of danger, threat, and risk would only increase the likelihood of a flow response due to naturally narrowed attention, thoughts limited to survival (e.g., fight or flight) with little room for outside self-consciousness thinking, and the individual's response being automatic, reinforcing the present focus and deep absorption characteristic of a flow state.

Pleasure

The flow construct is still the subject of research and expansion. Research concerning flow and pleasure (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) in order to expand current knowledge on enjoyment and individual potentiation as partially caused by eudemonic pleasure would be interesting. Also, research exploring the differences between hedonic and eudemonic pleasure responses as related to flow would provide additional insight into the experience of flow within work, activity, and living.

Flow and Creativity

Pelaprat and Cole (2011) defined creativity as "literally a form of making, the making of "the whole world of culture" based on the products of imagination" (p. 399), with Vygotsky characterizing creativity as a process that arises from imagination (Pelaprat & Cole, 2011); through the process of resolving and connecting through abstraction, the individuals create a solid image, object, or situation that reflects their world. Through the process of resolving and connecting within the imaginations, the experience of creativity as a product of successful, connecting the abstract to develop a concrete solution, results in the feeling of one being more deeply integrated into the world (Pelaprat & Cole, 2011).

Research has only scratched the surface regarding the experience of flow during an imaginative or creative process. While flow has been the subject of research within artists (Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988), it has not been explored deeply as a fluid process within creativity and imagination. The implications of conducting such research would be the applications of flow within the learning process (see Rieber, 2001), and the elements of flow applicable to facilitate learning and motivation to learn. According to Getzels and Csikszentmihalyi (1964, 1976), mental imagery and spatial abilities have been positively correlated to creative behavior; thus, future research examining how science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) are taught and developing an educational environment that utilizes the components of flow with course content has profound implications for learning.

Real-Time Tracking of the Runner, Flow States, and Mood

Future research within the area of flow should utilize the Experience-Sampling Method (ESM) which requires individuals to respond to a short questionnaire (or experience-sampling form) whenever notified via an electronic beeper or alarm during random times during the day (and typically over the course of a week). This assessment method allows for the examination of the fluid experience of flow throughout the day, within multiple settings (Rodriguez-Sanchez, Schaufeli, Salanova, Cifre, & Sonnenschein, 2011), and, if paired with mood or emotion assessments, evaluates the experience of daily positive and negative emotions on flow. Sanchez et al. suggested that due to the "affective component (enjoyment)" (2001, p. 78) inherent in flow, fluctuations in flow are likely. Exploring the fluctuations of flow and mood throughout a day is of considerable interest. Pates et al. (2003) stated one key limitation to the Flow States Scales was their lack of measuring emotions or mood states.

Conclusion

Qualitative and quantitative research on the topic has led to a definition of flow that includes nine sub-experiences that, taken together, constitute the conscious state of flow. While conceptualized based on the nine components of flow, flow is a diverse experience, based on the person's level of ability (expert vs. amateur), activity, and cultural background.

A recent significant finding was the autotelic experience correlating negatively with performance (River, 2011). This would seem antithetical to the premise of the autotelic experience assisting athletes in performing difficult or painful physical tasks by fostering a motivational structure that allows for enjoyment of the act itself, instead of an anticipated positive future outcome from the action primarily driving motivation (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990).

With greater consideration of the motivational structures of the autotelic experience, this finding seems to support recent research and challenge traditional thinking about the autotelic experience.

Considering a new conceptualization of flow requires examining areas of flow that need further investigation. Included in this investigation involves addressing the following questions:

1. Privette (1983) questioned the possibility of triggers to flow. Research within flow has yet to explore the possibility of triggers to flow achievement. Thus, the question remains, are there triggers to flow? If so, are these triggers external or internal? Or both? Can moods be triggers to a flow state?

2. The vast implications of past and current research on flow warrant a new conceptualization of flow; one that defines extrinsic goals as present-oriented and more motivating for higher performing athletes. Can extrinsic goals facilitate a flow experience? What are the processes of extrinsic motivators on the affective process involved in flow?

3. Researching physically and mentally 'healthy' versus non-healthy adults (Sanchez et al., 2011) will expand the current flow model. The implications of additional research in this area expand more intimately into the health behavior research causing the question, "how "healthy" must one be to experience flow?" What does healthy mean when considering the current and changing model of flow? Can flow be a facilitator to positive health?

4- What are the differences in goals? Can intrinsic and extrinsic motives equally facilitate a flow experience?

The results of the present research warrant an investigation into how future researchers can expand or alter flow theory in the following ways: investigating situational antecedents to experiencing flow; assessing the experience of flow across performance domains (i.e., sport, exercise, work, or life-threatening situations) ; redefining flow to include the nuanced gradations of psychological performance between athletes in the state; expanding the definition of flow to include an understanding of the emotional and somatic processing that take place in flow (Ceja & Navarro, 2009); and promoting a new emphasis on the importance of present-based extrinsic rewards in the flow state. In addition, it appears important to update the conceptual underpinning of flow to include a depiction of the state as enabling an enhanced ability to process somatic and emotional responses with environmentally based contextual cues.

Sidebar

Discussion Questions

1. Considering the present discussion on flow, how do you define flow?

2. List two strengths and two weaknesses of the current flow model.

3. What elements of the flow model would you change?

To Cite this Article

Carter, L., River, B., & Sachs, M. (2013, Fall). Flow in sport, exercise, and performance: A review with implications for future research. Journal of Multidisciplinary Research, 5(3), 1731.

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