Ways to improye an angry mood: A look at gender and sports participation Research conducted by: Emily Zitelz: and Mindy Ater. Rice Uniyersity Dyeryiew People have different ways of improying their mood when angry. We have all seen people punch a wall when mad] and indeedr previous research has indicated that some people aggress to improye their mood (Bushman. Eiaumeister 55: Phillips, 2oo1}. What do the top athletes do when angry? Striegel {1994] found that anger often hurts an athlete's performance and that capability to control anger is what makes good athletes eyen better. This study adds to the past research and examines the difference in ways to improye an angry mood by gender and sports participation. The participants were 78 Rice Uniyersity undergraduates. ages 1? to 23. Of these 28 participants. 48 were females and 30 were males and 25 were athletes and 53 were non-athletes. People who did not play a yarsity or club sport were considered non-athletes. The 13 contact sport athletes played soccer, football, rugby. or basketball, and the 12 noncontact sport athletes participated in Ultimate Frisbee, baseball. tennis, swimming. yolleyball. crew, or dance. The participants were asked to respond to a questionnaire that asked about what they do to improye their mood when angry or furious. Then they lled out a demographics questionnaire. Note: This study used the most recent yersion of the StateTrait Anger Expression lnyentory {STAN2] {Spielbergen Sydeman, |Dwen 6: Marsh. 1999]