Taking risks: are you reflexive or impulsive?

«Humans have an additional capability that allows them to alter their environment as well as respond to it. This capacity both creates and reduces risk.»

Slovic, (1987)

Decision-making is key to success in sport because it usually involves taking risks to achieve our goals. We must select relevant information from the environment and proceed to choose the necessary course of action to respond to these contingencies. The question is: is our proficiency in decision-making dependent on situational variables or our personal characteristics?

Situational variables such as time restrictions, immediate reward (prize money, championship titles, etc.) or behavior of the opponents influence this process and can change our perception at will. However, individual factors exert an effect of their own and these could be of more relevance.

Several authors argue that cognitive styles should also be held accountable for athlete’s success or failure in the decision-making process. Cognitive styles refer to consistent ways in which people organize information provided by the environment before responding to it (Ezquerro & Buceta, 2001).

Taking risks under time constraints

In general, time is a game-changer when it comes to decision-making. Being able to gather all valuable information and design the best course of action in response is rarely an option in sports. And, of course, CrossFit is no different.

The «Sport of Fitness» can be heavily demanding on a cognitive-emotional level because the process of decision-making is both slow and fast. Strategizing for an Open workout entails a different process than racing another athlete mid-workout to try and beat them. The mental space in both situations is drastically different.

How do we handle these time domains based on individual differences? Well, it depends on which cognitive style is predominant. In this sense, we may find ourselves on either end of a continuum: reflexive – impulsive. Main differences between both cognitive styles are:

• Speed: impulsive individuals make decisions faster than reflexive individuals
• Precision: reflexive individuals make less mistakes than impulsive individuals
• Tendency: to choose between a risky or a more conservative action: impulsive athletes usually take more risks

You don’t have to be a psychologist to distinguish reflexive from impulsive individuals in the general public or even among elite-level CrossFit athletes. Brent Fikowski «The Professor» is considered one of the best strategists in the game. He narrows his actions down to the very smallest detail and sticks to it like glue. This gives him the winning hand in longer workouts because people usually surrender to the adrenaline of competition and go out too hot while Brent is just chilling, slowly snatching the lead from whoever has it.

Mat Fraser, on the other side, is highly impulsive. He rarely makes mistakes (because his ridiculous level of fitness backs him up) but when he does, it’s usually because he rushes into things. If you want to know what I mean, just go back to the semifinal round of the Speed Clean & Jerk in 2018 where he missed the clean and then the jerk on the final bar because he got on it too fast and ended up missing the cut for the final heat.

So… do I take my time or do I go for broke?

That’s a tricky question indeed and I’m afraid there’s no universal answer. First of all, just accept the way you’re made. Both cognitive styles have their perks and you can’t go from impulsive to reflexive or the other way around. These variables are heavily rooted in our personality so you’ll have to figure out how to work with what your Mama gave you.

As we’ve seen, impulsiveness allows for quicker decisions which is useful for short workouts where you lose if you blink. Reflexive athletes tend to suffer in those. However they find their groove when they’re given time to strategize and pick their moves.

My advice? Try and train for both:

• If you like to take your sweet time to plan and control every little detail of your performance, make sure to set yourself on fire and learn how to deal with uncertainty. CrossFit loves short power outbursts and the «unknown» so you need to be familiar and competent with it.
• If you enjoy taking risks and usually give little to no thought to strategies (or you’re the kind of athlete that changes it as soon as you hear 3, 2, 1, go!), learn how to pace yourself. Learn how to find a method to the madness from time to time. Thank me later.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Ezquerro, M., & Buceta, J. M. (2001). Estilo de procesamiento de la información y toma de decisiones en competiciones deportivas: Las dimensiones rapidez y exactitud cognitivas. Análise Psicológica, 19(1), 37-50.
Slovic, P. (1987). Perception of risk. Science, 236(4799), 280-285.