Information Processing and Constraints-based Views of Skill Acquisition: Divergent or Complementary?

Abstract

Since the middle of the nineteenth century, movement scientists have been challenged to explain processes underlying the control, coordination, and acquisition of skill. Information processing and constraints-based approaches represent two distinct, often perceived as opposing, views of skill acquisition. The purpose of this article is to compare information processing and constraints-based approaches through the lens of Fittsʼ three-stage model and Newellʼs constraints-based model, respectively. In essence, both models can be identified, at least in spirit, with ideas about skill described by Bernstein (1967, 1996). Given that the product of "skill acquisition" is the same, although the explanation of the processes might differ, it is perhaps not surprising that similarities between the models appear greater than the differences. In continuing to meet the challenge to explain skill acquisition, neural-based models provide a glimpse of the cutting edge where behavior and biological mechanisms underpinning processes of control, coordination, and acquisition of skill might meet.

Effectiveness and efficiency of virtual reality designs to enhance athlete development: an ecological dynamics perspective

“…Gaining this intertwined relationship between sub-systems of action, cognition and perception, which support interactions with a performance environment, is the fundamental basis for using technologies like VR systems to enrich athlete learning and performance. Interactions with key informational variables in a performance context act as boundaries that shape emergent patterns of behaviour (Anson, Elliott, & Davids, 2005).…”

Attentional Processes in Skill Learning and Expert Performance

“…As we shall see, the respective contributions depend both on skill level or stage of learning and on the nature and constraints of the task (see Anson, Elliot, & Davids, 2005;Bernstein, 1996). Assuming that controlled processing, but not automatic processing, relies heavily on the availability of a limited-capacity attentional resource (i.e., working memory), it follows that skilled performance depends on either efficient allocation of conscious attentional resources or automatization of certain subcomponents of the skill to free conscious resources.…”

The Cognitive Revolution at Age 50: Has the Promise of the Human Information-Processing Approach Been Fulfilled?

“…Recently, Anson, Elliott, and Davids (2005) compared these two approaches and concluded that the models of motor-skill acquisition developed from each are more similar than they are different. Among other points made by Anson et al is that the development of what they call the constraints-based approach was based to a large extent on a misunderstanding about human information processing.…”