Musical Performance Anxiety: Relations between Personal Features and State Anxiety Levels of Pre-Service Music Teachers

Musical performance anxiety, also known as stage fright, is such a significant obstacle to music performance that it can interfere with or even end careers. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between pre-service music teachers ’ state anxiety levels just before a concert and their genders, ages, self-efficacy, number of years of playing their instruments, length of daily instrumental practice time, and previous concert performance experiences. Data were gathered from forty-three pre-service music teachers (F=29; M=14) using State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) (Speilberger, Gorsuch & Luschene, 1970), Self-efficacy Towards Music Ability Scale (Özmenteş & Özmenteş, 2008) and a personal information form including information related with musical performance experience. Additionally, state anxiety inventory was administered to participants just before their solo performances. The results showed that pre-performance state anxiety levels of the female students are significantly higher than for the male students, and significant positive correlations were found between participants ’ state anxiety and trait anxiety levels. Additionally, negative significant correlations were found between participants ’ self-efficacy in their musical abilities and the number of years of playing their instruments; and a small negative correlation between state anxiety and self-efficacy was found. Results were discussed with reference to related literature and some suggestions were made concerning the results