Observations of behavioral violations as crisis indicators in competition.

22 basketball experts observed 53 male basketball players (aged 15–16 yrs) during a tournament for behaviors that violated the rules, classifying violations as minor or major and called or uncalled by officials. The experts coded the exact time of each of the 4 categorized violations and assigned each to 1 of 6 time phases defined by M. Bar-Eli (unpublished dissertation) with respect to psychological crisis vulnerability. More frequent violations were observed in the end phase of the 2nd half than in the other 5 phases. Minor violations were more frequent than major ones, although major violations were more likely to occur in the 2nd half than in the 1st half. This suggests that officials allowed more aggressive behavior at the end of the game. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)