Raoul R D Oudejans

..These results are more in line with distraction theories than self-focus theories, suggesting that attention to performance worries rather than to skill execution generally explains choking...

..We discuss this method, how it works and the potential it has for studying perceptual-motor skills in sport. Furthermore, the results of the basketball experiment are briefly summarized and complemented with new analyses...

..We argue that through reality-based training with anxiety, processes that underlie performance might be recalibrated to the new task constraints, thereby preventing a degradation of eventual performance in stressful situations...

..It is concluded that practising under anxiety can prevent choking in expert perceptual-motor performance, as one acclimatizes to the specific processes accompanying anxiety...

..However, as we will elucidate here, they misinterpret this hypothesis and present a data set that is seriously flawed, and hence not suited to test it. Therefore, their conclusions regarding the optical error hypothesis are in error...

..These results indicate that training exercises involving increased pressure can acclimatize shooting performance of ordinary police officers to those situations with elevated pressure that they may encounter during their police work...

..Results seem to suggest that anxiety has a direct influence on the relation between performance and perception. Attentional control theory is discussed to explain the current findings...

..Additional analyses showed that these effects are potentially related to changes in visual attention on task-relevant information...

..In combination with these findings, a decrease in search rate provided evidence for a decrease in processing efficiency as anxiety increased...

..Given the criticality of successful police performance, it is suggested that incorporating psychological factors (e.g. pressure) in training procedures may enhance performance...

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..Our results confirm that less variability in target-related performance in darts relates to perceiving the target as being bigger, thereby providing initial support for Proffitt and Linkenauger's proposal...

..We conclude that, in dynamic far aiming tasks such as basketball jump shooting, late pick-up of optical information is critical for the successful guidance of movements...

..Players relied on alpha in combination with the official basket's height to guide their shooting actions. In conclusion, basketball shooting appears to be based predominantly on angle of elevation information...

..Participants in both conditions retained accuracy when ball frequency was slowed, but lost accuracy when ball frequency was speeded, suggesting that not attention, but motor dexterity, was inadequate under high temporal constraints...

..These results provide additional support for the conscious processing hypothesis and insight into the relation between anxiety, performance, and movement behaviour...

..The findings support the idea that perceptual-motor learning can be enhanced by manipulating relevant constraints in the training environment, even for expert athletes...

..Findings provide support for attentional control theory, hereby also pointing to possible interventions to improve police officers' shooting performance under pressure...

..e., attentional, interpretational, and behavioral) at which anxiety may affect different aspects of goal-directed action. Finally, predictions are formulated and directions for future research suggested...

..The data further suggest that visual and movement control of aiming at a far target develop in close correspondence with the style of execution...

..In combination, these results suggest that changes in the representation of the movement structure are primarily responsible for the observed interference effects...

..Thus, there appeared to be a functional relationship between participants' actual action capabilities, rather than their state of physical fatigue per se, and perceived action possibilities...

..Moreover, findings indicate that when combined, running, aiming, and anxiety all compete for attention leading to suboptimal attentional control and possibly a decrease in performance...

..e., the open goal space. It is concluded that in far aiming tasks, ironic effects are accompanied by insufficiently long final fixations on the target...

..In conclusion, the contextual body image approach seems to be a promising framework for a better understanding of athletes' disordered eating...

..A plausible explanation for both sets of experimental findings is that negatively loaded stimuli are more attention demanding than positively loaded or neutral stimuli...