British Columbia skip Kelly Scott, centre, talks to lead Jacquie Armstrong, left, and second Sasha Carter during the Scotties Tournament of Hearts curling championships this month.
Jen Wilkinson can't stop talking when she gets on a dodge-ball court. She'll yell to her teammates about how to attack the other side. If someone on her side makes a good play, she shouts praise. After six years of playing the game through the Toronto Sport and Social Club, Ms. Wilkinson has come to realize that - more than quick ducking or fast throwing - being all talk is what wins games.
"We find that we play best when we talk together. We always notice that if we're not talking to each other, those are the worst games that we have," says Ms. Wilkinson, 30, who works for a non-profit organization in Toronto.
Teams that talk together, win together. In a recent study of tennis doubles teams, researchers at Florida State University found that winning teams talked strategy twice as much as losing teams. As well, victorious team members offered vocal encouragement to one another almost three times as frequently as losing ones. The importance of skill level and practice can't be denied, of course. But teams in a losing slump might want to try the talking cure.
"The teams that we investigated are all on the same level," says Gershon Tenenbaum, a professor of educational psychology at Florida State University. "But when we looked an analyzed the teams that won versus lost, we really saw that they communicated much more."
Communication among team members helps to create "shared mental models," or a common understanding of how to approach a challenge, Dr. Tenenbaum says. "For instance, when you communicate, 'I will do this,' and the other player says 'okay,' and confirms it, then you have a shared mental model of an action."
While communication is generally understood as a critical factor in team sports, there is little research measuring its specific role in how teams perform. Using video and audio recordings of National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division 1 female tennis doubles teams, Dr. Gershon and his co-authors found not only that winning teams communicate much more than losing teams, but also that they used two types of communication more often: strategizing and vocal encouragement.
"The emotional, affective side ... is not less important during the game as a communication between the pair than strategy and planning and confirmation of planning," Dr. Tenenbaum says. "When you make a mistake and your partner comes and says, 'Forget about it, you're a great player, we should do it next time,' this is a very important message."
Such messages help to create a sense of "collective efficacy," or the feeling that winning requires a team effort, not simply a great performance by one or two team members, Dr. Tenenbaum says.
"If only one player believes that they will win and the second does not, it will not work out well."
Ian Seeton tries to keep the chatter up among the Regulators, the men's league hockey team he plays for in Vancouver.
"It's organized chaos out there, so you have to have a system," the 32-year-old construction project manager says. "You're not going to get any better if you're not communicating. You have to be on the same page. And the only way to do that is to talk about what you're going to do."
When a team gets better, chances are they won't have to talk so much on the ice.
"The more expert you become, the less you rely on verbal communication," Dr. Tenenbaum says. "When people know each other very, very well, they actually share mental models. And therefore they don't need to communicate."
But while the need for talking about strategy decreases, emotional communication - whether it's a high-five or a simple "nice one!" - remains integral to reaching the winner's circle. Those kinds of messages help reinforce team cohesion and help players stay motivated, Dr. Tenenbaum says.
Mark Cecchetto has been playing Ultimate with the Toronto Sport and Social Club for several years now. And while his team is constantly discussing strategy as they fling a flying disc around in the hopes getting to the end zone, it is emotional communication that usually proves to be pivotal.
"For us, that's the difference between our good games and our bad games," the 34-year-old marketer says. "When we're playing well, it's very positive and sort of energizing. And when we're playing poorly, it's [team communication]pretty critical."
Considering the importance of communication, more coaches should encourage their players to talk more when they're on the field, Dr. Tenenbaum says. Too often, coaches simply stress what's needed to execute a play.
Practising drills or running plays can only take a team so far, Dr. Tenenbaum says: Teams that want to win need to get chatting.
"Communication is a must."
Dave McGinn