By Patricia Wen
At first, the Salem teenager balked when his parents asked him to see a shrink. "Do you think I have emotional problems?" asked Shelley Peirce, 15. But he gave it a try. Things weren't getting better on their own, so he thought he might as well get his head examined. Every week or so, he entered a therapist's office, plopped his 6-foot 2-inch frame into a sofa chair, and divulged his feelings. To his surprise, he's hooked. He and his therapist saw the results they wanted. He's swimming faster.
The lanky redhead has shaved two seconds off his 200-yard freestyle time, giving him confidence he may break away fro
m his lackluster past.
"My parents felt I was physically fit to swim, but mentally not tough enough," said Peirce, who practices 25 hours a week, in addition to seeing his sports psychologist.
More and more teenage athletes are sinking into the couches of sports psychologists, hoping it will save them from mediocrity in a world that values champions. By high school, many teenagers feel they can't handle more than one sport, let alone be ordinary at it. So they go for a psychological edge, hoping to be mentally tweaked into shooting flawless free throws or sinking perfect putts.
"When kids have problems in sports, it's often not mechanical. The problem is between their ears," said sports psychologist Alan Goldberg, head of Competitive Advantage, based in Amherst. "I'm a `head' coach - literally."
As sports psychologists explore the mental condition of adolescents, charging a typical rate of $100 an hour, they're often asked to inject determination where there is now daydreaming, or curb excessive sulking in a teenager who "choked" on a big play and now feels like Bill Buckner Jr.
While teenagers have many reasons to seek this mental edge, many acknowledge they want to bolster their athletic record to impress college admissions officers.
But not everyone is convinced all this mental manipulation of today's young jocks is harmless. Teenagers are at a critical age of developing character and forming new identities. Daydreamers might be burned-out teenagers who shouldn't be made to feel mentally ill. Sulkers could be learning humility.
"When kids are brought to a sports psychologist, they can view it as just more pressure to perform," said psychologist Sharon Gordetsky, who specializes in treating teenagers and children. "Somehow they're a failure because they haven't measured up."
"Some students see sports psychologists as no different than SAT preparation coaches, college admissions consultants, tutors, and trainers who help teenagers improve their performance. They tap into a teenage mindset that worries less about the stigma of seeing a therapist than the stigma of not being in the spotlight."
For the past year, Bryan Swaim, a soccer player at Noble & Greenough in Dedham, has visited his therapist, learning how over-analysis feeds nervousness. No figures exist on how many teenagers visit sports psychologists. But in the exploding field - nationwide membership in the professional group is about 1,100, almost double that of a decade ago - local practitioners say their clients are now predominantly high school athletes.
Ten years ago, mainly professional or college athletes sought these services. Then, if a typical teenager said he or she was seeing a sports psychologist, "people would have thought he was crazy," said Timothy Flannery of the National High School Federation, who works with coaches. "Now, people don't bat an eyelash at it."
Some teenagers still feel they could be judged as flawed if they see a psychologist, so they tell almost nobody."I haven't told anyone except my family. Even if it's a sports psychologist, it's still a psychologist," said one 17-year-old female swimmer from suburban Boston.
Still others keep the appointments a secret, not out of a fear of being exposed, but to reduce the likelihood that other athletes will seek therapy, thus diluting the competitive edge they believe they're acquiring.
A standard teaching method, some psychologists say, is to use visualization techniques, where athletes mentally rehearse competitive situations. Others help the athlete develop "relaxation tapes" with familiar music or sayings to play during the down time between races or while on the bus.
When they compete, they use positive "self-talk," saying things like "Nothing is going stop me."
If athletes complain about lack of concentration, they are given exercises such as staring at a finger for 10 minutes with the TV blaring in the background.
Sports psychologists come from varied backgrounds, and veterans in the field warn about charlatans. So far, the field offers the public little guidance about how to sort out all the professional labels - including psychologists, therapists, and consultants - associated with this field.
Only two things are clear. In order to practice in Massachusetts, psychologists are required to have state licenses that minimally require a doctorate in psychology.
And one of the profession's main groups, the Association for the Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology, has a list of standards - including a doctorate in some psychology or physical education area as well as sports psychology coursework - that confers the title of "certified consultant" in the field.
Insurance coverage for sports psychology falls into a gray area. While most clients pay out-of-pocket, some can get insurers to pay if the psychologist is able to document a mental ailment covered by the insurer. Some practitioners say there can be an abuse of the term "anxiety disorder" to cover sessions devoted to improving racing times, but there are also legitimate treatments of a range of psychological ailments.
The parents of Nick Paicos, 15, were concerned with how intensely their son got into basketball two years ago, doing running drills and shooting baskets for hours and hours. At first, they thought he was compensating for starting the sport relatively late, and standing a comparatively diminutive 5 feet 8 inches tall. But his obsession got more intense.
"We were worried," said his father, Kevin Paicos. "Where does compulsion end and dedication begin?"
The parents called Harvey Dulberg, who runs The Competitive Edge in Brookline. Dulberg diagnosed their son with obsessive-compulsive disorder. While working on that, Dulberg also talks to the teenager about mental toughness skills to give him a psychological edge on the court.
"Most of my life I've never been great at anything," said the high school sophomore. "I've been average. I just want to be a great basketball player."
Attaining some form of greatness is also a goal for Maggie Wilkens, 14, a skater from Rutland who hopes to compete nationally someday. She said she tends to choke in competition and works on this with her sports psychologist. She even distributes a brochure asking for donations to cover her skating costs, including sports psychology bills.
"I just want to land my double-axel jump," she said. "I can land them in practice, but not in competition. Not yet."