Most doctors also agree that the yips are different than “choking.” Each phenomenon is a stress-related reaction, but they differ greatly in severity.
Dr. Debbie Crews of Arizona State University explained that choking is the result of “paralysis by analysis.” An athlete gets so focused on their mechanics under pressure, that they lose all fluidity and grace.
Yips, on the other hand, are when fear and anxieties create such an overwhelming sense of panic that one cannot think or even act without extreme difficulty.
An example of a choke would be Jordan Spieth’s collapse on the final nine holes at the 2016 Master’s Championship.
After finishing the front nine with four-straight birdies, Spieth teed off on the tenth hole with a five-stroke lead and the green jacket seemingly in hand.
But around the tenth hole is when Spieth started to play differently. He lost his aggression and focus, and started playing very conservative golf.
Instead of trying to win, he was trying to defend his lead.
Spieth tried to make every swing as safe and mechanically smooth as possible. He got so caught up in overthinking his mechanics that it led to “paralysis by analysis.”
On the par-three 12th hole, Spieth shanked two balls into the water and finished with a quadruple-bogey, seven. On that hole alone, he fell three shots behind the leader, Danny Willett, and was never able to catch up.
A textbook example of a yips attack also occurred at this year's Master’s Tournament.
South African, Ernie Els, six-putted from within four feet of the pin on the very first hole of competition.
Els, who has been working through a notorious case of the yips in his late career, obviously had some nerves running through his body as he approached his first green of the tournament.
After missing his first putt, Els began to panic. Each of his following attempts looked more and more uncomfortable.
By his third attempt, Els looked as if he didn’t even know how to set his feet, let alone guide his putter to strike a golf ball.
By his fifth attempt, he couldn’t tap it in from just six-inches away.
Els had such an insane fear of missing another putt, that even the easiest of actions became impossible for him.
If he had a pen in his hand instead of a golf club, chances are that Els couldn’t have even written his name on a piece of paper at the time.
Focal Dystonia
A cramping hand. (Wikimedia Creative Commons "Focal Hand Dystonia.")
Many medical studies have also listed the yips as a focal dystonia – a neurological dysfunction that affects specific muscles. An example of a focal dystonia would be a writer’s cramp. Although the brain is sending one message, the body is cramping and reacting in a way it wouldn’t naturally. This phenomenon is prevalent amongst musicians, who report not being able to hit certain notes on the guitar.