Waiting in sport: a kinesiological perspective on a universal psychological experience

Waiting is a universal experience in sport, marked by distinct cognitive patterns and affective dynamics that carry psychophenomenological significance. This study investigates the psychogenesis of sport across three key dimensions of sport—preparation for participation, competitive engagement, and spectatorship—through the lens of sport behavioral science. The findings reveal three major domains of psychological processing: (1) During preparation for participation, athletes engage in psychological preparation and emotional regulation during waiting periods. Goal orientation exerts neuromodulatory effects, linguistic self-regulation enhances neural plasticity, and neural motor coding supports a stable cognitive state of readiness. Emotional regulation draws on autonomic neuromodulation strategies, models of directed cognitive resource allocation, and mechanisms of social neuroendocrine regulation. (2) During competition, athletes experience waiting through psychological strategising and stress coping. Tactical neuromodulation under pressure, neuro-metabolic resilience mechanisms, and cognitive restructuring models inform strategising. Stress coping involves neural appraisal reconstruction, sympathetic-vagal balance paradigms, and coordinated social neuroendocrine responses. (3) Concerning spectatorship, spectators’ waiting experiences encompass emotional engagement and psychological resonance. Anticipatory motivation aligns with neural coding theories, empathic stress maps onto neuro-resonance models, and emotional regulation follows neuro-metabolic balancing processes. Therefore, psychological resonance emerges through neurochemical models of group identity, neural embodiment simulations, and co-activation within the social brain network.