Overview

Sport and Exercise Psychology at University of Potsdam (UP) is one of the leading international research groups regarding the dual process view on (a) exercise motivation and (b) the motivation to use performance enhancing substances (e.g. doping in sport). Our lab is part of the UP’s Research Focus Cognitive Sciences. We use reaction time-based and psychophysiological methods to investigate automatic evaluation – feelings and thoughts that people may be unwilling or unable to report – at play during exercise and sport. Our lab is perhaps the sole research facility in Germany where research in sport and exercise meets this meta-theoretical perspective.

Affiliated with our group is the ‘Zentrum für Praktische Sportpsychologie (ZPS)’. This center coordinates and delivers sport psychology services to more than 1,200 adolescent and adult elite athletes from the federal state of Brandenburg’s Gifted Schools of Sport and Olympic Training Centers (and among them many national team athletes).