How does experience and practice change our ability to extract information from our environment and how can we best facilitate this process? What changes in our brain during perceptual learning? Articles/links: Perceptual learning and human expertise Expert baseball batters have greater sensitivity in making swing decisions . More information: http://perceptionaction.com/ My Research Gate Page (pdfs of my articles) My ASU Web page Podcast Facebook page (videos, pics, etc) Subscribe in iOS/Apple ...
Mar 21, 2017•21 min
Sports Science Shorts: will baseball’s new proposed rule changes to speed the pace of play make the game more exciting and attract new fans? What can we learn from similar attempts made in soccer? What determines a sport’s fans level of excitement Articles: How to Make Soccer More Attractive? Rewards for a Victory, the Teams' Offensiveness, and the Home Bias Does the Three-Point Rule Make Soccer More Exciting? Evidence From a Regression Discontinuity Design Suspense: Dynamic Incentives in Sports...
Mar 07, 2017•12 min
News: A look at a few recent articles in the area of motor learning and performance. Can the structure of motor variability predict the rate at which a performer learns a new skill? Does using social media before a game increase anxiety in an athlete? What differs between the way in which I child and adult learns a motor skill? Articles: Can the Structure of Motor Variability Predict Learning Rate? Facebook use and its relationship with sport anxiety Children and Adults Both Learn Motor Sequence...
Feb 28, 2017•17 min
A discussion with Danny Newcombe, Lecturer in Sports Coaching and PE, Oxford Brookes University. Topics discussed include: applying the constraints-led approach to practice design and physical education curriculum, research on the constraints-led approach --what does it tell us about its effectiveness and are we using the correct methods of evaluation? More information about my guest: http://www.shs.brookes.ac.uk/daniel-newcombe https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Daniel_Newcombe https://twitte...
Feb 21, 2017•37 min
A discussion with Diane Ste-Marie, Professor in the School of Human Kinetics at the University of Ottawa. Topics discussed include: why do athletes tend to perform better when they have control over the feedback they receive and when is self-controlled feedback ineffective? How do athletes use observation of themselves or others to acquire or improve sports skills and what factors should be taken into account when applying observational learning in sport? More information about my guest: https:/...
Feb 14, 2017•58 min
A discussion with Dave Collins, Professor & Director of the Institute of Coaching & Performance, University of Central Lancashire. Topics discussed include: what it’s like to be a sports psychologist, talent development, performance analytics, technique change, bridging the gap between research and practice, and the role of social media in research. More information about my guest: http://www.uclan.ac.uk/staff_profiles/professor_dave_collins.php http://www.gm4p.com/ https://twitter.com/d...
Feb 07, 2017•49 min
Do athletes perform better when they talk to themselves? Should the talk be motivational or instructional? Positive or negative? Does it work for both novices and experts? Articles/links: The influence of self-talk on the performance of skilled female tennis players Self-talk influences vertical jump performance and kinematics in male rugby union players Self-Talk of Marathon Runners Self-Talk and Sports Performance: A Meta-Analysis Effects of Self-Talk: A Systematic Review Self-talk: Review and...
Jan 31, 2017•17 min
News: A look at a few recent journal articles. Do soccer players and referees sometimes see an event that never really happened? Can a basketball player detect where a dribbler is headed using sound alone? Is doing exercise in front of a mirror effective? Articles: Seeing the unseen? Illusory causal filling in FIFA referees, players, and novices Expert Players Accurately Detect an Opponent's Movement Intentions Through Sound Alone The Effects of Either a Mirror, Internal or External Focus Instru...
Jan 24, 2017•15 min
Why does the presence of others change the performance of an individual athlete? Why is this social facilitation effect sometimes good and sometimes bad? Does it matter whether the other people are observing, evaluating or performing the same action? Does being “observed” via activity monitoring technology facilitate performance? Articles/links: The Dynamogenic Factors in Pacemaking and Competition Social Facilitation From Triplett to Electronic Performance Monitoring Social "facilitation" as ch...
Jan 17, 2017•14 min
Should the goal of practice be to reduce movement variability to as low a value as possible? Is high variability the signature of an unskilled performer or a necessity for effective learning? Articles/links: A schema theory of discrete motor skill learning Feedback-Induced Variability and the Learning of Generalized Motor Programs Optimizing generalized motor program and parameter learning Variability in baseball pitching biomechanics among various levels of competition What variability tells us...
Jan 10, 2017•34 min
My list of the top 5 sports psychology stories from 2016: The death knell for brain games? Deliberate practice fights back! What to do about the relative age effect? Advances in Teamwork Research Somebody’s watching (or monitoring) me Articles/links: Do “Brain-Training” Programs Work? Peak: The New Science of Expertise Age-ordered shirt numbering reduces the selection bias associated with the relative age effect Reversal of the Relative Age Effect Team Synergies in Sport: Theory and Measures The...
Jan 03, 2017•13 min
A look at visual channeling theory and its consequences for perception. Why are some people blind to approaching objects in certain areas of their visual field and what implications does it have for sport? Articles/links: The Charles F. Prentice Award Lecture 1990: specific tests and specific blindnesses: keys, locks, and parallel processing Visual field defects for unidirectional and oscillatory motion in depth Impaired Velocity Processing Reveals an Agnosia for Motion in Depth More information...
Dec 06, 2016•17 min
My report from the Sports Biometrics Conference held from Nov 13-15, 2016. Issues discussed include validity of analytics data, whether athletes are going to agree to be continuously monitored and the frequent disconnect between science and practice. Articles/links: http://sports-biometrics-conference.com/ http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2097866-the-sleeve-that-could-save-baseball-exclusive-look-at-new-mlb-technology More information: http://perceptionaction.com/ My Research Gate Page (pdfs o...
Nov 29, 2016•10 min
News: A look at a few recent articles examining the effects of anxiety and pressure on performance and methods for counteracting these effects. Does pressure effect the planning or online control of movements? Could increasing anxiety in practice benefit motor learning? What are holistic goals and how can they reduce pressure effects? Articles: The interaction between practice and performance pressure on the planning and control of fast target directed movement Perceptual-motor learning benefits...
Nov 22, 2016•15 min
Why do we have two eyes? Is binocular vision necessary for successful performance of motor actions like those involved in sports and driving? Or is it just redundant information? What is it like to live with just one eye? Articles/links: Binocular Vision and Stereopsis The visual and driving performance of monocular and binocular heavy-duty truck drivers Vision with one eye: a review of visual function following unilateral enucleation Prospective Assessment of Stereoscopic Visual Status and USAF...
Nov 15, 2016•34 min
Which is better: specific or variable practice? How does it depend on what you are trying to achieve in terms of retention and transfer of skill? The ultramarathon as a complex system and my report on surviving my first one! Articles/links: A sensorimotor basis for motor learning: evidence indicating specificity of practice Specificity and variability of practice Specificity of Learning a Sport Skill to the Visual Condition of Acquisition Cave Creek Thriller 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Nov 08, 2016•15 min
Is fear in a performer a debilitating problem that must be overcome? Or can freezing from fear actually improve our ability to perceive and act? Articles: Ready and waiting: Freezing as active action preparation under threat Simulated self-motion alters perceived time to collision Freezing promotes perception of coarse visual features Seeing fearful body language rapidly freezes the observer's motor cortex More information: http://perceptionaction.com/ My Research Gate Page (pdfs of my articles)...
Oct 31, 2016•12 min
A look at perceptual-motor development from the ecological perspective. If it’s not pre-programmed by our genetics, how does a child’s pattern of movements emerge from the dynamical constraints of their environment? And how does movement shape perceptual discovery? Articles/links: Motor Development: A New Synthesis Infant bouncing: The assembly and tuning of action systems Crawling versus walking infants' perception of affordances for locomotion over sloping surfaces Motor Development (Adolph &a...
Oct 25, 2016•21 min
A discussion Andrew Wilson from Leeds Beckett. We discuss ecological psychology ideas like motor abundance, functional equivalence and degeneracy, Andrew’s recent study on task dynamics and information in throwing, his work on affordances and throwing prehistoric stones, and the current and future state of the ecological approach. More information about my guest: http://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/staff/dr-andrew-wilson/ http://psychsciencenotes.blogspot.co.uk/ https://twitter.com/PsychScientists htt...
Oct 18, 2016•52 min
A look at perceptual-motor development from an information processing, stage-based perspective. What is the relative importance of genetics and early experience? Are their critical periods in which perceptual and motor skills must develop? What is an efference copy? Articles/links: What Is Motor Development? The Lessons of History Infancy and Human Growth Effects of visual deprivation on morphology and physiology of cells in the cat's lateral geniculate body Extent of recovery from the effects o...
Oct 13, 2016•24 min
Thinking aloud about some sports science issues as I prepare for my first 50K ultra. What is the optimal focus of attention for a runner and how does it change as you switch from road to trail? How can one best acquire the skill of downhill running? Does it depend on where you look? Articles/links: My training log: https://www.strava.com/athletes/17201121 Race I am doing: http://www.aravaiparunning.com/cave-creek-thriller/ Related blog post with figures: http://perceptionaction.com/37d/ “Look ar...
Oct 11, 2016•15 min
A discussion with Kylie Steel Senior Lecturer in the School of Science and Health at Western Sydney University in Australia. In the interview we discuss biological motion: what is it and how can we apply it to sport, how important is it to be able to quickly recognize a teammate on the field or court, do compression garments work and if so how, and how are skilled acquisition professionals viewed by coaches and players. More information about my guest: http://www.uws.edu.au/staff_profiles/uws_pr...
Oct 06, 2016•23 min
What is stereotype threat and how can it affect sports performance? Is it possible that being challenged by a statement like “girls can’t play sports” could make a female athlete perform better in some situations? Articles: On the causal mechanisms of stereotype threat: can skills that don't rely heavily on working memory still be threatened? “Girls should cook, rather than kick!” – Female soccer players under stereotype threat Girls can play ball: Stereotype threat reduces variability in a moto...
Oct 04, 2016•13 min
A discussion with Joe Baker, Professor in the School of Kinesiology and Health Science at York University in Canada. Topics include: how good are we at identifying talent, early specialization vs diversification, designing effective learning environments, retention and transfer of sports skills, and are sports good for our long term health? More information about my guest: http://www.yorku.ca/bakerj/ https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Joe_Baker https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-baker-320b9a32 ht...
Sep 29, 2016•32 min
A look at the unique perceptual and cognitive issues associated with uninhabited air vehicles (UAVs) and helicopters. Are fully automated drones a good idea? What are some of the technologies that have been developed to improve performance with these alternative forms of flight? -Knowing when not to act in sports ( Time 19:36 ) Articles/links: Human Factors Implications of UAVs in the National Airspace Impact of prior flight experience on learning Predator UAV operator skills Good Vibrations: Ta...
Sep 27, 2016•24 min
A discussion with Costas Karageorghis, Reader in Sport Psychology from Brunel University and author of the new book “Applying Music in Exercise and Sport”. We discuss topics including how music can make athletes perform better and for longer, how music effects an athlete’s attentional focus and perceived effort, how to choose the best music for a particular sport or activity, when not to use music and how teams can use music. More information about my guest: http://www.brunel.ac.uk/people/costas...
Sep 22, 2016•35 min
News: What type of feedback do coaches give to boxers between rounds? Does the attentional focus, level of autonomy and valence of the feedback relate to winning and losing? How do the inherent capabilities of a performer (i.e., skill level) interact with their momentary capabilities? Articles/links: http://sports-biometrics-conference.com/ Coaching cues in amateur boxing: An analysis of ringside feedback provided between rounds of competition Location estimation of approaching objects is modula...
Sep 20, 2016•12 min
A discussion with Amit Katwala, senior writer for Sport Magazine and author of the new book: The Athletic Brain: How Neuroscience is Revolutionizing Sport and Can Help You Perform Better. we discuss topics including how the brains of elites athletes are different than normal people, some methods teams are using to short cut this process with brain training, ways you can trick yourself into having greater endurance, how to better diagnose concussion, the idea of sporting IQ, and examples of sport...
Sep 15, 2016•26 min
A look at some of the developments in cockpit technology. Do “glass cockpits” really lead to better flying performance? Can Head-Up Displays and Highways in the Sky reduce pilot workload? Has automation in aviation lived up to its promise? -Why does having a “quiet eye” resulting in better sports performance? ( Time 20:45 ) Articles/links: Learning to fly glass cockpits requires a new cognitive model. Can a glass cockpit display help (or hinder) performance of novices in simulated flight trainin...
Sep 13, 2016•25 min
Does the advantage of being relatively older (i.e., being born in Jan, Feb or March) hold up when the highest levels of sport are examined? Why might this effect reverse, giving a clear advantage to the relatively young underdogs? Articles: Annual age grouping and athlete development: A meta-analytical review of relative age effect in sport No Relative Age Effect in the Birth Dates of Award Winning Athletes in Male Professional Team Sports Selection bias and peer effects in team sports: The effe...
Sep 08, 2016•10 min
