This study analyzed visual search strategies of soccer players in one-on-one defensive situations on the field. The 8 subjects were 4 experts and 4 novices. While subjects tackled an offensive player for possession of the ball, their eye movements were measured and analyzed. Statistically significant differences between the visual search strategies of experts and novices showed experts fixated more often on both the knee and the hip regions of opponents than novices did. This suggests that information gained from the movements of these areas was important in anticipating an opponent's next move. Findings suggest the importance in soccer for players not to focus too closely on the ball, but on an opponent's knee and hip.

This study analyzed the visual behaviors of soccer players while they kicked with the inside of the foot, which involved near and far aiming skills. Participants (N = 8) were required to step forward and kick a ball to hit a target. The top three scorers were defined as the High-score group, and the three low scorers were defined as the Low-score group. Analysis indicated that the High-score group was characterized by longer quiet eye durations, which were defined as the final fixation durations on the target prior to the initiation of a kicking movement, than the Low-score group in the preparation phase. The High-score group also set their visual pivot on the frontal space between the target and the ball in the kicking phase. These two visual behaviors of the High-score group are important for soccer players to kick a ball successfully with the inside of the foot.

This study analyzed visual search strategies of soccer players in one-on-one defensive situations on the field. The 8 subjects were 4 experts and 4 novices. While subjects tackled an offensive player for possession of the ball, their eye movements were measured and analyzed. Statistically significant differences between the visual search strategies of experts and novices showed experts fixated more often on both the knee and the hip regions of opponents than novices did. This suggests that information gained from the movements of these areas was important in anticipating an opponent's next move. Findings suggest the importance in soccer for players not to focus too closely on the ball, but on an opponent's knee and hip.

The purpose of this study was to compare the visual search behaviors of experienced basketball players with those of novices as they anticipated the success of a free throw. In basketball, the accurate judgment of the result of a free throw at an early time is an important factor in both performing the next play for the players and in deciding team tactics for coaches. The subjects were twelve experienced male basketball players and twelve novice counterparts. The task was to anticipate the success of free throws by responding verbally with IN , OUT or Uncertain while viewing randomized successful / unsuccessful video-based models of free throws. The video was captured from a position to the side of the shooter s shooting arm and perpendicular to the plane of the intended motion of the ball. The stimuli were temporally occluded after the ball released the shooter s hand and before the ball reached the goal. In addition, the participants visual search behaviors were acquired by using an eye movement tracking system. The results indicated that experienced players were able to anticipate a successful free throw earlier and more accurately than could the novices. Experienced players had an effective strategy to anticipate the result of free throws that was based on not only the ball s trajectory but also the use of shooter s coordinated motions as advanced cues for predicting the success of a free throw before the release of the ball. The experienced players viewing points were distributed on the shooter s lower body until the execution phase and then on the shooter s shooting arms before ball release. This effective visual search behavior is therefore one of the most important factors in improving accurate judgment at an early time.

AbstractSome of the mechanisms underlying superior performance in sports may be clariˆed by investigating the role of visual information in the execution of particular responses by expert athletes. The aim of this study was to examine how soccer players process visual information when executing a tactical pass in a 4 vs. 4 attacking play scenario. To identify the cognitive processes operating during task execution, we measured eye movement and correlated it with verbal reports from players. The subjects comprised 30 soccer players with diŠering proˆciencies (15``experts'' and 15``sub-experts''). 2 tests were carried out: a test to evaluate the level of passing skill, and a decision-making test to evaluate the reproducibility of tactical passing and the accuracy of passes aimed to speciˆc locations. Eye movements were measured during the decision-making test. Furthermore, in each trial of the decision-making test, verbal reports were collected. These related to how and why participants decided to pass the ball to any particular player among the 4 attackers on screen and, in order to determine their best judgment, how they captured the play situation and what they paid attention to. The results revealed that for execution of the pass, the experts were signiˆcantly more proˆcient at passing accurately to the aimed location, and their passing judgment was more reproducible in comparison to the sub-experts, although both groups had a uniform level of passing skill in terms of pass execution. In addition, eye movement data obtained during pass execution conˆrmed that in the play observation phase, while experts maintained their line of sight on other objects, they also maintained a longer gaze on defensive players to identify gaps between them. Also in the ball approach phase, the experts maintained a longer gaze on the player who was judged to be the best choice for receiving an accurate pass. These observations suggest that the superior passing performance of expert soccer players is attributable to accurate and e‹cient extraction of visual information and utilizing it in the context of their accumulated knowledge base.