TY - JOUR
T1 - The influence of attention on learning and performance
T2 - Pre-movement time and accuracy in an isometric force production task
AU - Lohse, Keith R.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by Army Research Office Grant W911NF-05-1-0153 to the University of Colorado. The author would like to thank Alice Healy and David Sherwood for advice and discussion in designing the experiment and the preparation of this manuscript.
PY - 2012/2
Y1 - 2012/2
N2 - Lohse, Sherwood, and Healy (2010) found that an external focus of attention (FOA) improved performance in a dart-throwing task and reduced the time taken between throws, but using the time between trials as a measure of preparation time is relatively crude. Thus, the current experiment analyzed how FOA affects accuracy and pre-movement time in an isometric force production task, to study how FOA affected motor planning. In the current experiment, training with an external focus improved the accuracy of the isometric force production task during training and during retention and transfer testing. During training, an external FOA also significantly reduced pre-movement time in early trials. These findings are interpreted as reduced explicit control of movement as a function of an external FOA, and help to integrate FOA research with other motor control phenomena and neuropsychological theories of motor control.
AB - Lohse, Sherwood, and Healy (2010) found that an external focus of attention (FOA) improved performance in a dart-throwing task and reduced the time taken between throws, but using the time between trials as a measure of preparation time is relatively crude. Thus, the current experiment analyzed how FOA affects accuracy and pre-movement time in an isometric force production task, to study how FOA affected motor planning. In the current experiment, training with an external focus improved the accuracy of the isometric force production task during training and during retention and transfer testing. During training, an external FOA also significantly reduced pre-movement time in early trials. These findings are interpreted as reduced explicit control of movement as a function of an external FOA, and help to integrate FOA research with other motor control phenomena and neuropsychological theories of motor control.
KW - Focus of attention
KW - Motor control
KW - Motor learning
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84856589196&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.humov.2011.06.001
DO - 10.1016/j.humov.2011.06.001
M3 - Article
C2 - 21777989
AN - SCOPUS:84856589196
SN - 0167-9457
VL - 31
SP - 12
EP - 25
JO - Human Movement Science
JF - Human Movement Science
IS - 1
ER -