Keeping an eye on noisy movements: On different approaches to perceptual-motor skill research and training

Contemporary theorising on the complementary nature of perception and action in expert performance has led to the emergence of different emphases in studying movement coordination and gaze behaviour. On the one hand, coordination research has examined the role that variability plays in movement control, evidencing that variability facilitates individualised adaptations during both learning and performance. On the other hand, and at odds with this principle, the majority of gaze behaviour studies have tended to average data over participants and trials, proposing the importance of universal 'optimal' gaze patterns in a given task, for all performers, irrespective of stage of learning. In this article, new lines of inquiry are considered with the aim of reconciling these two distinct approaches. The role that inter- and intra-individual variability may play in gaze behaviours is considered, before suggesting directions for future research

Increased complexities in visual search behavior in skilled players for a self-paced aiming task

The badminton serve is an important shot for winning a rally in a match. It combines good technique with the ability to accurately integrate visual information from the shuttle, racket, opponent, and intended landing point. Despite its importance and repercussive nature, to date no study has looked at the visual search behaviors during badminton service in the singles discipline. Unlike anticipatory tasks (e.g., shot returns), the serve presents an opportunity to explore the role of visual search behaviors in movement control for self-paced tasks. Accordingly, this study examined skill-related differences in visual behavior during the badminton singles serve. Skilled (n D 12) and less skilled (n D 12) participants performed 30 serves to a live opponent, while real-time eye movements were captured using a mobile gaze registration system. Frame-by-frame analyses of 662 serves were made and the skilled players took a longer preparatory time before serving. Visual behavior of the skilled players was characterized by significantly greater number of fixations on more areas of interest per trial than the less skilled. In addition, the skilled players spent a significantly longer time fixating on the court and net, whereas the less skilled players found the shuttle to be more informative. Quiet eye (QE) duration (indicative of superior sports performance) however, did not differ significantly between groups which has implications on the perceived importance of QE in the badminton serve. Moreover, while visual behavior differed by skill level, considerable individual differences were also observed especially within the skilled players. This augments the need for not just group-level analyses, but individualized analysis for a more accurate representation of visual behavior. Findings from this study thus provide an insight to the possible visual search strategies as players serve in net-barrier games. Moreover, this study highlighted an important aspect of badminton relating to deception and the implications of interpreting visual behavior of players

Spotting expertise in the eyes: billiards knowledge as revealed by gaze shifts in a dynamic visual prediction task.

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Considerations for the study of individual differences in gaze control during expert visual anticipation: An exploratory study

Recent perspectives for the studyof perceptual-motor expertise have highlighted the importance for considering variability in gaze behaviour. The present paper explores the prevalence of variability in gaze behaviour in an anticipation task through examining goalkeepers gaze behaviours when saving soccer penalty kicks, withaprimary focusonoffering new considerations for the studyof variability ingaze behaviour. Asubset of data from five goalkeepers in the previously published article of Dicks et al. ((2010) Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 72(3), 706-720) were reanalysed, with a focus on ten successful penalty saves for each goalkeeper. As the aim was to conduct exploratory analyses of individual differences in goalkeeping performance, data were not averaged across participants and instead intra- and inter-individual differences are described using descriptive statistics. The main observation was that variation in the goalkeepers' gaze behaviours existed and were evident both between and within individuals, specifically with regards to quiet eye duration but also for percentage viewing time and visual search patterns. However, QE location appeared to represent the only invariant gaze measure with the location being on the ball for the majority of trials. The current exploratory analysis suggested that experienced goalkeepers did not converge on the same gaze patterns during successful anticipation performance. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to extant gaze behaviour literature before considering implications for future research

Quiet Eye and Performance in Sport: A Meta-Analysis

Research linking the “quiet eye” (QE) period to subsequent performance has not been systematically synthesized. In this paper we review the literature on the link between the two through nonintervention (Synthesis 1) and intervention (Synthesis 2) studies. In the first synthesis, 27 studies with 38 effect sizes resulted in a large mean effect (d = 1.04) reflecting differences between experts’ and novices’ QE periods, and a moderate effect size (d = 0.58) comparing QE periods for successful and unsuccessful performances within individuals. Studies reporting QE duration as a percentage of the total time revealed a larger mean effect size than studies reporting an absolute duration (in milliseconds). The second synthesis of 9 articles revealed very large effect sizes for both the quiet-eye period (d = 1.53) and performance (d = 0.84). QE also showed some ability to predict performance effects across studies

Quiet Eye research – Joan Vickers on target

In this target article (TA; CISS2016_100), Joan Vickers gives an overview of 20 years of research on her discovery that a relatively long lasting fixation before movement initiation enhances complex-motor performance, the so-called Quiet Eye (QE) phenomenon. Vickers’ main article (CISS2016_101) is the focus of sixteen peer commentaries (CISS2016_102 – CISS2016_117), authored by sport scientists with a special focus on the QE (Causer; Farrow & Panchuk; Klostermann, Vater & Kredel; Mann, Wright & Janelle; Schorer, Tirp & Rienhoff; Williams; Wilson, Wood & Vine), by sport scientists with different research foci (Baker & Wattie; Davids & Araujo; Frank & Schack; Helsen, Levin, Ziv & Davare; Rodrigues & Navarro), and by experts in human perception from disciplines beyond sport science (Foulsham; Gegenfurtner & Szulewski; Spering & Schütz; Watson & Enns). Finally, critiques, suggestions, and extensions brought forward by the commentators are acknowledged by Vickers in her closing response (CISS2016_118)

A Longitudinal Study Of Maternal Style, Young Adult Temperament And Cognition, And Program Outcome In Guide Dogs

How does maternal style, experienced over the first few weeks of life, affect later outcomes? Equally important, what is the role of an adolescent’s temperament and cognitive skills? The quest to understand which factors early in development lead to positive life outcomes is an endeavor that transcends species boundaries. In this dissertation, I explore the nature of these relationships using data collected from birth to adolescence in a cohort of prospective guide dogs. In Study 1, I quantify the behavior of mothers (n = 21) toward their litters. The results revealed that canine maternal style can be summarized in one principal component that explained a significant proportion of the variation and was stable across weeks, variable across individuals, and related to maternal cortisol and experimental measures. In Study 2, I examine the influence of early maternal style on later behavior, as well as on success in the guide dog program up to two years later. I also evaluated the influence of young adult temperament and cognition on success. Measures of maternal style as well as adolescent temperament and cognition were significantly associated with outcome in the guide dog program, even when controlling for each other. Successful dogs had less involved mothers as puppies, and demonstrated superior problem-solving skills, lower levels of perseveration, and reduced anxious vocal behavior as young adults. Temperament and cognition are frequently assessed in tasks purporting to measure one or the other, but large-scale studies usually only include tasks assigned to either domain. Dogs in our study completed a battery of both temperament and cognitive tasks. Thus, in Study 3, I address the categorization of ‘temperament’ and ‘cognitive’ tasks using both confirmatory and exploratory analyses and validate the findings using subjective ratings from puppy raisers, salivary cortisol, and program outcome measures. Forcing tasks into groups defined by cognition or temperament led to poor results, whereas a bottom-up approach revealed that putative cognitive and temperament measures interact in unanticipated ways. Taken together, these results suggest that mothering and the not-so-straightforward interplay of temperament and cognition provide important clues to the future success of an animal