Is an external focus of attention more beneficial than an internal focus to ball catching in children?

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F61989592%3A15510%2F17%3A73581664" target="_blank" >RIV/61989592:15510/17:73581664 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://hrcak.srce.hr/index.php?show=clanak&id_clanak_jezik=275664&lang=en" target="_blank" >https://hrcak.srce.hr/index.php?show=clanak&id_clanak_jezik=275664&lang=en</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Is an external focus of attention more beneficial than an internal focus to ball catching in children?

Original language description

The performance benefits of adopting an external relative to an internal focus of attention have been demonstrated for many different targeting and balance tasks. No study has examined attentional focus effects for interceptive motor skills. Also, the majority of studies have used adult participants. In this study, children (mean age: 8.75 years, SD=0.79; 15 girls, 9 boys) were required to catch tennis balls in the frontal plane under the external focus (EF), internal focus (IF), and control (Cont) conditions. Participants were asked to stand behind a yellow line (2 × 100 cm), 15 m apart from a tennis ball throwing machine. In a within-participant design, participants performed 10 trials under each IF (“concentrate on your hands”), EF (“concentrate on the ball”), or Cont (no focus instructions) conditions. The order of conditions was counterbalanced. Performance data were analyzed using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) with repeated measures on attentional focus conditions (internal, external, and control) (alpha=.05). Catching performance was significantly different and more effective in the EF (M=1.53, SD=0.25) than in the IF (M=1.39, SD=0.35) condition, while both EF and IF were not significantly different from the Cont (M=1.49, SD=0.28) condition. The current findings suggest that the external focus of attention is more beneficial, compared to the internal focus, to motor performance of an interceptive skill in children.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

30306 - Sport and fitness sciences

Project

<a href="/en/project/GA16-17945S" target="_blank" >GA16-17945S: Mechanisms of motor skill learning in the children with impaired motor coordination</a><br>

Continuities

P - Projekt vyzkumu a vyvoje financovany z verejnych zdroju (s odkazem do CEP)

Publication year

2017

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Kinesiology

ISSN

1331-1441

e-ISSN

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Volume of the periodical

49

Issue of the periodical within the volume

2

Country of publishing house

HR - CROATIA

Number of pages

7

Pages from-to

235-241

UT code for WoS article

000417977600013

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85041842001