An Investigation of Attentional Foci and their Temporal Patterns: A Naturalistic Study in Expert Figure Skaters

Abstract

This study aimed to explore attentional foci and their temporal patterns in expert skaters in real competition situations. Individual self-confrontation interviews were held with 8 expert figure skaters while they watched their videotaped program performed in official competitions. Qualitative data analysis revealed that skaters used a substantial number of foci, which were classified by content and characteristics. Event listing was used to display the patterns of foci over time, revealing that skaters used distinct processes to prepare for, perform, and evaluate different program elements. These results highlighted the great flexibility and variability of attentional focus, according to circumstantial factors. Magill (2003) defines attentional focus as "the directing of attention to specific characteristics in a performance environment or to action-preparation activities" (p. 149). In sport psychology, researchers have focused on the effectiveness of different types of attentional focus. Broadening the perspective on this issue, studies on choking under pressure (Hill, Hanton, Matthews, & Flemming, 2009) have given rise to a number of explanatory theories (e.g., Beilock & Carr, 2001;Gucciardi & Dimmock, 2008;Masters & Maxwell, 2004) of how attentional focus disruptions can significantly hinder performance.To address these issues, most studies have used an experimental approach to compare the effects of various types of attentional focus on performance involving simple motor tasks or decontextualized sport tasks (e.g., simulated skiing, golf putting). Experimental approaches generally have two main features: The perspective is (a) dichotomous and (b) static. A dichotomous perspective places types of focus in opposition: internal and external (Nideffer & Sagal, 1998;Stevinson & Biddle, 1999;Wulf & Prinz, 2001), broad and narrow (Nideffer & Sagal, 1998), proximal and distal (Bell &Hardy, 2009), or associative and dissociative (Morgan & Pollack, 1977;Schomer, 1987;Stevinson & Biddle, 1999). In the static perspective, a single focus is associated with a discrete action. This focus is imposed by experimental conditions without considering either the preceding or succeeding foci.Recently, some alternate approaches have shed new light on attentional focus processes in athletes, notably by examining attentional focus in natural performance situations (Oudejans, Kuijpers, Kooijman, & Bakker, 2011). Experimental studies that oppose two focus types have produced inconsistent results (Bell & Hardy, 2009;Salmon, Hanneman, & Harwood, 2010). Some authors claim that this dichotomous perspective could limit our understanding of how athletes use attentional focus in natural performance situations (Bernier, Codron, Thienot, & Fournier, 2011;Salmon et al., 2010) confrontation interviews with eight professional golfers based on a video of their playing in two conditions: (a) during a training session and (b) during a competition. They inductively analyzed the collected qualitative data in order to precisely classify the at...

The Influence of Attentional Focus on Balance Control over Seven Days of Training

“…These discrepant findings have raised debate on the utility of an external focus for all tasks (Peh, Chow, & Davids, 2011) and for populations that have been understudied (e.g., older adults at risk for falling) . Second, attention is dynamic (Hutchinson & Tenenbaum, 2007) and focus is rarely static throughout a single training session (Bernier, Trottier, Thienot, & Fournier, 2016;. Thus, to conclude that providing one "dose" of external focus instruction will remain as the prominent focus over multiple practice sessions and elicit long term changes in motor learning is unsubstantiated.…”

Letter to the editor concerning the article “Performance of gymnastics skill benefits from an external focus of attention” by Abdollahipour, Wulf, Psotta & Nieto (2015)

“…Instead, Abdollahipour et al (2015) 67 focus discussion on theory and laboratory/fundamental research findings (e.g., Kal, van der 68 Kamp, & Houdijk, 2013;Land, Frank, & Schack, 2014;Wulf, Höß, & Prinz, 1998) Indeed, elite-level athletes report beneficial effects from focussing on aspects of the 88 movement (e.g., Bernier, Trottier, Thienot, & Fournier, 2015;Carson, Collins, & 89 MacNamara, 2013;MacPherson, Collins, & Morriss, 2008;Nyberg, 2015;Orlick & 90 Partington, 1988;Robazza & Bortoli, 1998) and, sport psychologists often employ explicit 91 movement imagery techniques to enhance competitive performance (e.g., Carson,Collins,& 92 Jones, 2014; Collins, Morriss, & Trower, 1999;Martindale & Collins, 2012;Wang & Zhang, 93 2015). Accordingly, failure to contextualise the study within current coaching/sport 94 psychology practices, or to explain why athletes' perceptions are apparently wrong, surely 95 limits the paper's ability to serve its purpose in a purportedly applied discipline.…”

“…For example in the study by Bernier et al (2015) 113 one elite-level ice skater reported "during the approach to the jump, actually, I'm doing the has the potential to be unfamiliar in that it may conflict with useful imagery that is ordinarily 118 employed (cf. our comments in the previous paragraph).…”

Defining cricket batting expertise from the perspective of elite coaches

“…Expert batters employ routines, both behavioural and cognitive, in between deliveries to manage these pressures. Similar to the research findings on performance routines [43,44], this suggestibly allows experts to manage more effectively their emotions; attentional focus [45,46]; concentration [47] and enhance consistency of performance [48,49]. Interestingly, a crucial aspect of the pre-performance routine literature is said to involve being able to channel attention from irrelevant thoughts to task-specific thoughts.…”