Evaluating weaknesses of "perceptual-cognitive training" and "brain training" methods in sport: An ecological dynamics critique

The recent upsurge in "brain training and perceptual-cognitive training," proposing to improve isolated processes, such as brain function, visual perception, and decision-making, has created significant interest in elite sports practitioners, seeking to create an "edge" for athletes. The claims of these related "performance-enhancing industries" can be considered together as part of a process training approach proposing enhanced cognitive and perceptual skills and brain capacity to support performance in everyday life activities, including sport. For example, the "process training industry" promotes the idea that playing games not only makes you a better player but also makes you smarter, more alert, and a faster learner. In this position paper, we critically evaluate the effectiveness of both types of process training programmes in generalizing transfer to sport performance. These issues are addressed in three stages. First, we evaluate empirical evidence in support of perceptual-cognitive process training and its application to enhancing sport performance. Second, we critically review putative modularized mechanisms underpinning this kind of training, addressing limitations and subsequent problems. Specifically, we consider merits of this highly specific form of training, which focuses on training of isolated processes such as cognitive processes (attention, memory, thinking) and visual perception processes, separately from performance behaviors and actions. We conclude that these approaches may, at best, provide some "general transfer" of underlying processes to specific sport environments, but lack "specificity of transfer" to contextualize actual performance behaviors. A major weakness of process training methods is their focus on enhancing the performance in body "modules" (e.g., eye, brain, memory, anticipatory sub-systems). What is lacking is evidence on how these isolated components are modified and subsequently interact with other process "modules," which are considered to underlie sport performance. Finally, we propose how an ecological dynamics approach, aligned with an embodied framework of cognition undermines the rationale that modularized processes can enhance performance in competitive sport. An ecological dynamics perspective proposes that the body is a complex adaptive system, interacting with performance environments in a functionally integrated manner, emphasizing that the inter-relation between motor processes, cognitive and perceptual functions, and the constraints of a sport task is best understood at the performer-environment scale of analysis

Four models of anarchist engagements with constitutionalism

Political anarchism’s hostility to constitutional activity has been frequently identified as the core feature distinguishing it from other members of the socialist tradition. However, four minority anarchist traditions which engage in democratic activism can also be identified: minor formal engagement, horizontal structural reformism, revolutionary (anti-)representation, and guerrilla activism. To analyze these models of engagement, this paper examines their application to recent events such as the 2014 Scottish independence referendum and the 2016 Brexit referendum. The paper also draws out differences between the anti-politics of anarchism and those utilised by populist political movements in Europe and North America, and highlights how different strategies respond to and incorporate standard anarchist critiques of electoralism and state-centred democratic practice. It is argued that participation in referendums (direct democracy) is no less problematic than representative elections, but that some selective engagement can be justified on anarchist grounds

Turning up the variable noise: the quiet eye, functional variability and advancements in perceptual cognitive expertise

Background: It has now become widely accepted that a prominent component of sport expertise is in part due to more effective, and efficient perceptual mechanisms. In comparison to lesser-skilled athletes, experts can identify key sources of information earlier (Helsen and Pauwels, 1993). With the introduction of the Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules within the English Football League System, the development of young players has increased in prominence, with a greater emphasis on the understanding of what it takes to become an expert. The Quiet Eye (QE) has emerged as a key perceptual variable associated with expertise (Vickers, 2007). The QE is defined as the final fixation towards a location in the environment that supports a coupled motor action. The QE is a fixation that lasts over 100ms, remaining within 3* of visual angle (Vickers, 2016). In the field of Goalkeeping (GK) the QE has been found to be one of the key mechanisms in understanding skilled performance (Piras and Vickers, 2011). It is widely accepted that expert performance is generally contrived of longer QE fixations, earlier and later offsets, yet the locations GK’s use is still contested. As such current experimental protocols fail to truly understand expert performance of individuals in more complex environments. Objectives: Theoretical and empirical attempts are made to meet an ecological ‘call to arms’ and challenge the traditional perceptual research in goalkeeping. The importance of maintaining a representative experimental trial is stressed to understand expertise from the natural performance environment. Secondly, youth and senior GK of similar relative skill level are used to understand QE behaviours between ages in a representatively designed experimental task. Methods: Study 1 compares the traditional penalty kick protocol with a 1 v 1 dynamic condition, where the striker can move the ball before shooting at the goal. Study 2 compares expert senior goalkeepers against youth goalkeepers in the dynamic task to understand QE differences between ages with relative skill levels. QE behaviour is collected with SMI-ETG as well as an external camera capturing the motor action of the goalkeeper. Results: In study 1, QE duration was significantly longer in the penalty kick trial, with an earlier onset and later offset. Further findings also showed goalkeepers dependence upon the ball in penalty kick tasks. Goalkeepers viewed the visual pivot (VP) more during dynamic kick tasks than in the penalty kick task. 7 | P a g e In study 2 senior goalkeepers had a longer QE duration and a later onset and offset than the youth goalkeepers. Specific QE behaviours could be attributed with specific locations, the ball requiring longer onset and duration than the VP. It was observed without statistical significance that senior expert goalkeepers operated within a solution bandwidth comprised of variability in QE behaviour. Discussion: It is suggested a more representative performance environment is required due to the causal nature of manipulated task constraints, and the QE. It was shown that by increasing variability in the experimental condition, goalkeepers utilised different QE behaviours. The significance of these findings aids researchers understanding of expertise and the link to representative tasks and their fidelity to the athlete’s natural environment. Previous research understanding in goalkeeping expertise in the penalty kick paradigm may only provide a minor insight into goalkeepers skilled performance. In the second study, we find that similar to the novice v expert domain, senior and youth experts have significantly different QE behaviours. Senior goalkeepers used longer fixations, later onsets and offsets. The later onsets are a particularly interesting finding, as it generally goes against the grain of previous QE research. We suggest that the later onset is a product of extreme temporal and spatial constraints that youth goalkeepers face. They potentially may not have the physical capabilities to move on later visual information, whereas senior goalkeepers may do. Secondly, it is suggested that expertise comes in the form of a functional relationship with information in the visual feed. Due to significant differences occurring in the QE between different locations (ball and visual pivot), it is recommended that the use of putative optimal visual search patterns is irresponsible and that athletes define their expertise by a complimentary relationship with the environment. Further still, it is shown that experts act within a solution manifold characterised by variability between the QE onset and offset behaviours. Developing this finding across bigger samples is key, as it provides ground to challenge current developments of QE training methods that opt for a single generalisable QE behaviour. We provide an account for the importance of adopting a practical lens to developing the QE beyond novel visual interventions, and into an embodied pedagogy

Anarchism and moral philosophy

This chapter looks at the pervasiveness of ethical discourses and analyses within anarchism, and how the priority given to moral evaluation distinguished it from rival revolutionary movements, such as orthodox Marxism. It traces the different meta-ethical positions and normative formulations found within anarchist traditions. It argues that a practice-based anti-hierarchical virtue ethics is most consistent with anarchist core (but not fixed) commitments to materialism, anti-universalism and social solidarity

Anarchism and business ethics

‘Anarcho’-capitalism has for decades occupied a small but significant position within ‘business ethics’, while the anarchism associated with the larger traditions of workers and social movements has only had a spectral presence. Social anarchisms’ forms of opposition and proposed alternatives to standard liberal business practices, identities and presuppositions have appeared only fleetingly in mainstream business ethics. In the light of these anarchist hauntings, this paper identifies and explores social anarchism’s critique of dominant forms of business ethics, and business practice. It applies anarchism’s critical insights to market-based ethics, of which Milton Friedman’s influential essay, ‘The Social Responsibility of the Businessman is to Increase Profits,’ is used as an exemplar. This paper differentiates the anarchist critique from the criticisms of corporocentric, economic-liberalism emanating from social democrats and advocates of corporate social responsibility. It demonstrates the pertinence of social anarchist approaches to re-thinking the co-ordination of the production and distribution of goods, highlighting inadequacies in state-centred managerial responses to the harms and deficiencies of Friedman’s free-market

Anti-fascism and the ethics of prefiguration

There is a tension between rival anti-fascist praxes: social democratic, orthodox Marxist and indeed some anarchist movements privilege consequentialist approaches because the goal of defeating fascism is viewed as the supreme value, whilst most anarchists and heterodox Marxist approaches have tended to support prefigurative methods. This paper clarifies the concept of prefiguration to illustrate the differences and conflicts between these anti-fascist approaches and the possibilities of a convergence. In doing so it identifies and replies to some of the main criticisms of prefigurative anti-fascism

Toward a better understanding of self-construal theory: an agency view of the processes of self-construal

This article offers a novel perspective on self-construal theory. Self-construal concerns how individuals understand who they are in relation to the broad set of cultural influences in which they live. We look at the nature and antecedents of self-construal, and characterize it as a self-process, rather than self-knowledge. Integrating work from the literature on social and evolutionary psychology, and philosophy, we suggest that the differences between independent and interdependent self-construal are best understood from a self-agency perspective. This concerns how people assess whether they are the causes of an action and, if so, whether their causal role depends on other people. We introduce and discuss the roles of 3 different modalities of agency involved in self-agency assessment: implicit (sensorimotor), intermediate (self-related affordances), and explicit (reflective) self-agency. We offer a conceptual model on how self-agency relates to power, evolutionary motivations and to social and cultural affordances, in the formation of, and interaction with, different types of dominant independent and interdependent self-construals

Promissory Note, 29 March 1843

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/aldrichcorr_b/1065/thumbnail.jp

Rebel alliances: the means and ends of contemporary British anarchisms

This thesis examines, classifies and evaluates the tactics and organisational methods of British and Irish anarchist groups, which operated in the period 1984-1999 (although reference is made to groupings and events outside of this period). The thesis explains how class struggle anarchism, which was a minority trend even within the libertarian milieu, has developed into a significant and lively (anti-)political movement. This thesis examines recent groups through their own publications and their accounts of their recent actions. Previous studies have attempted to assess anarchist methods through either liberal or traditional Marxist categories. This thesis develops a mode of assessment that is consistent with the methods of evaluation used by anarchists themselves. This prefigurative ethic is used to build up an ideal-type of anarchism that is consistent with the main characteristics of libertarian theory. Anarchist prefiguration - which demands that the means must be synecdochic in relation to the ends - requires that the oppressed become the agents who bring about change. Oppression is irreducible to capitalism alone, but in most contexts, economic oppression will be a significant force in the creation of the oppressed agent's identity. Anarchists' preference for 'direct action' captures their commitment to the means being in accordance with the ends, and the primacy of the oppressed in resisting their oppression. The anarchist ideal is used as a standard to assess the operations of existing anarchist groups. Consistent with prefiguration, anarchist organisation and tactics have to be multiform and flexible, without strategic priority being given to any single organisation or structure. Anarchist tactics must also involve a variety of oppressed subjects, while undermining hierarchies of power. It will be shown that certain organisational methods associated with anarchism; such as old style syndicalism is incompatible with the prefigurative ethic. Similarly certain organisational structures, often dismissed as inconsistent with anarchist principles, such as temporary small groups carrying out selective propaganda by deed, can, under certain conditions, be consistent with anarchism. The growth of class struggle anarchism is shown to be a result of its prefigurative and multiform organisation and its corresponding diversity of tactics

Spanish anarchist engagements in electoralism: from street to party politics

The eruption of the Spanish 15M movement in 2011 was marked by a high degree of political participation and creative experimentation. The political repertoire has constantly been re-evaluated, with methods revised and evolving, from the occupation of public spaces to the recent creation of new constitutional parties. One of the key aspects of these tactical revisions has been the involvement of anarchist actors in an experimental process of engagement in electoral processes, a method of political engagement anarchists standardly oppose. Our study identifies the motivations and theoretical justifications that have recently led libertarian activists to take the electoral path. This paper stands in the small but growing tradition of works that examine the recent phenomenon of new parties built by ‘street’ activists, but uniquely concentrates on a detailed case study of the anarchist actors linked to the platform Castelló en Moviment (CsM). It thus describes the anarchist influence in recent electoral developments, identifies proponents’ justifications for engaging in these previously rejected methods and highlights some of the doubts raised about the electoral experiment