Why You Choke Under Pressure

“When we are performing our normal, practiced tasks everyday, we often are – counterintuitively — not paying attention to all the little details of what we are doing; our prefrontal cortex is running largely on autopilot. But in times of intense stress, like a playoff game, major presentation, or a job interview, your prefrontal cortex can go into overdrive. When the pressure is on, we often start focusing on the step-by-step details of our performance to try and ensure an optimal outcome and, as a result, we disrupt what would have otherwise been fluid and natural.” – Harvard Business Review