Novice motor skill performance and task experience is influenced by attentional focusing instructions and instruction preferences

A distal focus of attention leads to superior performance on a golf putting task

“…Consistent with previous research (McKay & Wulf, 2012), participants in the current study reported a preference for a distal focus of attention. Preference has been demonstrated to have an influence on the effectiveness of focus of attention instructions (Marchant et al, 2009;Weiss et al, 2008), hence preference is an important potential confounding variable to measure.…”

“…The absence of some form of manipulation check (see Marchant, Clough, Crawshaw, & Levy, 2009) is an important limitation which complicates interpretation of Perkins-Ceccato et al's results.…”

“…Early research (e.g., Wulf, et al, 1998) Marchant et al, 2009;Porter et al, 2010) and post experiment (e.g., Freudenheim et al, 2010;Stoate & Wulf, 2010). There is clearly a lack of standardization in the administration of manipulation checks.…”

Attention, workload, and performance: A dual-task simulated shooting study

“…A scoring system was adapted from previous work on attentional focus and dart throwing (Marchant, Clough, & Crawshaw, 2007;Marchant, Clough, Crawshaw, & Levy, 2009;McKay & Wulf, 2012;Radlo, Steinberg, Singer, Barba, Melnikov, 2002). Any shot that landed within the 'bull's-eye' was worth 5 points and each surrounding circle depreciated in value by 1 point.…”

On the continuing problem of inappropriate learning measures: Comment on Wulf et al. (2014) and Wulf et al. (2015)

“…Some representative examples of studies using these tasks include throwing various objects such as beanbags (Ávila, Chiviacowsky, Wulf, & Lewthwaite, 2012;Chiviacowsky & Wulf, 2007;Chiviacowsky, Wulf, Medeiros, Kaefer, & Tani, 2008;Chiviacowsky, Wulf, Wally, & Borges, 2009;Saemi, Wulf, Varzaneh, & Zarghami, 2011), darts (Marchant, Clough, & Crawshaw, 2007;Marchant, Clough, Crawshaw, & Levy, 2009;Radlo, Steinberg, Singer, Barba, & Melnikov, 2002), cricket balls (Hooyman, Wulf, & Lewthwaite, 2014), tennis balls (Pascua, Wulf, & Lewthwaite, 2015;Saemi, Porter, Ghotbi-Varzaneh, Zarghami, & Maleki, 2012), soccer throw-in (Weeks & Kordus, 1998) hitting tennis balls (Wulf, McNevin, Fuchs, Ritter, & Toole, 2000, Experiment 1), golf pitch shots (Wulf, Lauterbach, & Toole, 1999;Wulf et al, 2000, Experiment 2;Wulf & Su, 2007), and golf putting (Badami, VaezMousavi, Wulf, & Namazizadeh, 2011. And these studies have investigated topics in skill learning that have both theoretical and practical importance, such as attentional focus, self-controlled practice and feedback, and of course, autonomy support and enhanced expectancies.…”