Being in the Zone: the Importance of Culture to Peak Performance in Sport, Arts and Work

“入戏”（being-in-the-zone，bitz）是一种表达，指的是那些通常和经常从事某种创造性活动的人，突然经历了一种意想不到的能力提升，他们的表现能力不仅达到了有史以来最好的水平，而且比他们想象的要好。Bitz在软件编码等工作实践，演奏乐器或体育赛事等音乐实践方面经验丰富。音乐家、运动员和创意工作者在反思他们的活动时会讲述这样的时刻，这通常是因为这些时刻显然会让他们对自己的特定创意实践产生一种深刻的承诺感，并对他们的身体和心灵产生一种积极的感觉，以便能够“进入区域”。在这个区域内是一种经验，帮助许多人维持和继续在他们的例行和重复的做法，并提供了一个经验，无可争议地提供了一个积极的精神和身体的感觉。在这个区域内很大程度上被分析为一个内部的心理状态，主要是借鉴心理学，如果不是全部。即使是在团队活动中，比如足球比赛中，进入状态也被解释为参与者的内部活动。一个现在广为人知的例子是著名的运动心理学实践，要求球员“想象”他们在运动中的最佳时刻。在这种理解中，巅峰或异常出色的表现来自于个体内部，因此被视为一种心理现象，但"入戏"也是一种文化现象。例如，在计算机程序员对软件编码的描述中，经常会出现突然激烈的编码回合，但这种回合是否具有高能力（因此是“在区域内”）通常也由所解决问题的复杂性和所产生的软件代码的质量来判断。问题的复杂性和代码的质量都是文化判断，例如，后者经常借鉴所谓的Unix哲学，即重视代码的简单性。在音乐和体育运动中也可以举出类似的例子，高水平的能力不仅在于“按正确的顺序得到音符”或获胜，而且在于如何做到这一点。这种判断是文化判断，存在于体验"在区"的个体之外。只有整合关于"在状态"本质的文化见解，才有可能充分理解"在状态"。本项目旨在通过开发促进"在状态"的实践，为"在状态"开辟一种新的文化途径，从而有助于福祉，并就心理学与社会的关系展开重要的学术辩论。这种理解对参与文化活动和积极欣赏身心都有重要影响。理解“在区”提供了理解参与各种创造性活动的引人注目和强烈积极的欣赏的方法。这种理解可以转化为建议和实践，关于如何创造一个积极的欣赏这样的活动，如音乐和体育，以及如何结构的建议和实践，产生积极的态度，以心理和身体。正是这些后面的教训，将形成一个关键的一部分，传播这项研究，在我们的建议，进入伦敦奥运会2012年文化奥林匹克运动会的早期结果，从讨论。它还告诉我们，我们希望从这个网络开发一个大的赠款提交，这将提供详细的经验工作和行动研究，将经验工作转化为政策成果的形式，关于如何促进更好地欣赏文化和创造性活动及其对身体和心理的积极影响的实用建议。

'Being-in-the-zone' (bitz) is an expression for moments when someone who normally and routinely undertakes a certain creative action experiences a sudden, and often unexpected, increase in their competence in performance, often experiencing themselves as performing not only at their best ever but in a way they better than they had thought possible. Bitz is experienced in work practices like software coding, musical practices like playing an instrument or in sporting events. Such moments are recounted by musicians, sportspeople and creative workers, when reflecting on their activity and often because these moments clearly engender a deep sense of commitment to their particular creative practice and a positive sense of their body and psyche for being able to 'get in the zone'. Being-in-the-zone is an experience that helps many to sustain and continue in their routine and repetitive practices and provides an experience that inarguably offers a positive sense of psyche and body.Being-in-the-zone has largely been analysed as an internal psychic state, drawing primarily if not wholly on psychology. Even when being-in-the-zone occurrs as part of team events, such as in football, it has largely been interpreted as an event internal to the participants. One now widely known example of this is the well-known sports psychology practice of asking players to 'visualise' their best moments in sport. In such an understanding, peak or unusually good performance comes from within the individual and is therefore dealt with as a psychological phenomenon.Yet being-in-the-zone is also a cultural phenomenon. For example, there are within the accounts of software coding given by computer programmers often stories of sudden intense bouts of coding, but whether such bouts were of high competence (and so were 'in the zone') is also usually judged by the complexity of the problem addressed and by the quality of software code produced. Both the complexity of a problem and the quality of code are cultural judgements, for example the latter often draws on the so-called Unix Philosophy that values simplicity of code. Similar examples in music and sport can be given, where a high level of competence does not just inhere in 'getting the notes in the right order' or in winning, but in how these are done. Such judgements are cultural ones that exist beyond the individuals who experience being-in-the-zone. Only with the integration of cultural insights about the nature of being-in-the-zone will there be the potential for fully understanding being-in-the-zone.This project seeks to open up a new cultural approach to being-in-the-zone that will be able to contribute to well-being, by developing practices that promote being-in-the-zone, and develops important academic debates about the relation between psychology and society. Such an understanding can have important impacts on participation in cultural activities and on positive appreciations of both psyche and body. Understanding being-in-the-zone offers ways of understanding compelling and strongly positive appreciations of participation in various creative activities. This understanding can be translated into advice and practices about how to create a positive appreciation of doing such activities, like music and sport, and how to structure advice and practices that produce positive attitudes to psyche and body. It is these latter lessons that will form a key part of dissemination of this research in our proposal to enter the London Olympics 2012 Cultural Olympiad with early results from discussion. It also informs our desire to develop a large grant submission from this network which will provide detailed empirical work and action-research converting that empirical work into policy results in the form of practical advice about how to promote better appreciation of cultural and creative activities and their positive effects on bodies and psyches.