The Prediction of Musical Performance Anxiety
This study addressed the identification of key predictor variables of musical performance anxiety among constructs previously shown to have associations with musical performance anxiety. Participants were 118 (75 female and 43 male) undergraduate and postgraduate music students in Adelaide, South Australia. They completed self-report measures of musical performance anxiety, cognitive strategies and self-statements, trait anxiety, self-esteem, personal efficacy, and six dimensions of perfectionism. Multiple regression analyses revealed catastrophizing to be the main predictor of musical performance anxiety, with personal efficacy a lesser predictor. The findings suggest that relationships with musical performance anxiety previously reported for such characteristics as perfectionism, gender, and trait anxiety are substantially explicable in terms of catastrophizing cognitions and personal efficacy. The implication of these findings is to narrow the prediction and possible explanation of musical performance anxiety to a focus on cognitions.