What is Learned in Mental Practice of Motor Skills: A Test of the Cognitive-Motor Hypothesis

To test the cognitive-motor hypothesis, mental practice effects were examined using two tasks judged to differ only in the degree of motor involvement. Male college students (N = 60) learned either the high motor task or the low motor task under conditions of physical practice (PP), mental practice (MP), or no practice (NP). On each task, the PP group received 12 physical trials; the MP group received one physical, nine mental, then two physical trials; and the NP group received one physical trial, a rest period, and then two physical trials. As predicted, the relative effectiveness of mental practice differed between the two tasks. On the low motor task there was no difference between MP and PP and both groups were superior to NP (p < .05). For the high motor task MP was no better than NP and PP was superior to both (p < .05). It was concluded that performance improvement through mental practice takes place predominantly within the cognitive aspects of motor skills.

Download Full-text

Cognitive Demand, Imagery, and Frequency of Mental Rehearsal as Factors Influencing Acquisition of Motor Skills

Journal of Sport Psychology ◽

10.1123/jsp.3.1.35 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 3 (1) ◽

pp. 35-45 ◽

Cited By ~ 55

Author(s):

E. Dean Ryan ◽

Jeff Simons

Keyword(s):

Motor Skills ◽

Relative Frequency ◽

Cognitive Task ◽

Motor Task ◽

Mental Practice ◽

Physical Practice ◽

Motor Tasks ◽

Factors Influencing ◽

Male College ◽

Actual Trial

Male college students (N= 39) learned two novel perceptual motor tasks differing in demand across a cognitive-motor continuum, under conditions of physical practice (PP), mental practice (MP), or no practice (NP). On each task, the PP group was given 12 actual trials; the MP group received one actual, nine mental, then two actual trials; and the NP group received one actual trial, 10 minutes rest, then two actual trials. Results showed no difference in learning between MP and NP groups on the predominantly motor task, with the PP group significantly superior to both. On the predominantly cognitive task, however, the MP group performed as well as the PP group, and both were significantly superior to the NP group. Two additional questions concerning the influences of imaging ability and relative frequency of mental practice rendered equivocal results.

Download Full-text

Efficacy of Mental Imagery in Enhancing Mental Rehearsal of Motor Skills

Journal of Sport Psychology ◽

10.1123/jsp.4.1.41 ◽

1982 ◽

Vol 4 (1) ◽

pp. 41-51 ◽

Cited By ~ 31

Author(s):

E. Dean Ryan ◽

Jeff Simons

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Style ◽

Mental Imagery ◽

Motor Skills ◽

Motor Performance ◽

Visual Images ◽

Single Session ◽

Physical Practice ◽

Mental Rehearsal ◽

Learning Improvement ◽

Better Than

To investigate the mental imagery aspect of mental rehearsal, 80 male traffic officers from the California Highway Patrol learned a novel balancing task during a single session. Based on a pretest questionnaire, subjects were categorized as imagers, nonimagers, or occasional imagers and assigned to one of six groups accordingly: imagers asked to use imagery in mental rehearsal, imagers asked to try not to use imagery, nonimagers asked not to use imagery, nonimagers asked to try to use imagery, physical practice, or no practice. It was hypothesized that a person's preferred cognitive style would prove most effective for use in mental rehearsal and that using another style would cause a decrement in learning. Improvement scores indicated no differences between subjects who initially reported typically using imagery and those reported typically not using it, but groups asked to use imagery in mental rehearsal were superior to those asked not to (p<.001). Overall, physical practice was better than the grouped mental rehearsal conditions, and both were better than no practice. Subjects reporting strong visual imagery were superior to those with weak visual images (p<.03), and those reporting strong kinesthetic imagery were superior to those with weak kinesthetic images (p<.03). Regardless of one's typical cognitive style, the use of vivid imagery appears quite important for enhancement of motor performance through mental rehearsal.

Download Full-text

Physical Practice is Superior to Mental Practice In Enhancing Cognitive and Motor Task Performance

Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology ◽

10.1123/jsep.13.3.281 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 13 (3) ◽

pp. 281-293 ◽

Cited By ~ 44

Author(s):

Jeffrey S. Hird ◽

Daniel M. Landers ◽

Jerry R. Thomas ◽

John J. Horan

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

Cognitive Task ◽

Relative Proportion ◽

Motor Task ◽

Mental Practice ◽

Effect Sizes ◽

Control Group ◽

Physical Practice ◽

Pursuit Rotor ◽

All Treatment

This study compared varying ratios of physical to mental practice on cognitive (pegboard) and motor (pursuit rotor) task performance. Subjects (36 males and 36 females) were randomly assigned to one of six conditions experiencing different amounts of combined mental and physical practice. Seven practice sessions (four trials per session for the pegboard and eight trials per session for the pursuit rotor) were employed. ANOVA results showed that all treatment conditions, except the pegboard control group, showed significant differential pre- to posttest improvement. Furthermore, effect sizes and significant linear trends of posttest scores from both tasks showed that as the relative proportion of physical practice increased, performance was enhanced. In support of previous meta-analytic research, for all treatment groups, the effect sizes for the cognitive task were larger than for the motor task. These findings are consistent with the symbolic-learning theory explanation for mental-practice effects. In addition, the results indicate that replacing physical practice with any mental practice would be counterproductive.

Download Full-text

Developing a literature-based glossary and taxonomy for the study of mental practice in music performance

Musicae Scientiae ◽

10.1177/1029864917715062 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 23 (2) ◽

pp. 196-211

Author(s):

Susan Mielke ◽

Gilles Comeau

Keyword(s):

Motor Skills ◽

Scientific Literature ◽

Music Performance ◽

Mental Practice ◽

Future Research ◽

Classification Methods ◽

Physical Practice ◽

Frequency Of Use ◽

Tree Diagram

Mental practice refers to the use of imagery as opposed to the physical or motor skills used in physical practice. It is a strategy frequently discussed with regard to the acquisition of skills required for music performance, and recent scientific literature confirms the benefits of mental practice. However, a review of that literature reveals inconsistencies and a lack of clarity in the use of terminology. To better understand this problem of terminology, 33 current studies on mental practice in music performance were assembled and examined for both the quantity and quality of term usage. Terms were identified and recorded using terminology and classification methods from Cabré (1999), and The Pavel, Terminology Tutorial. Terminological records were created for each term appearing more than once in the literature for a total of 83 records. Issues related to frequency of use (repetition), use of multiple terms (synonymy), lack of term definitions, and the need for clarity in term usage (semantic vagueness and ambiguity) were then analyzed using these records. This terminology process resulted in the creation of a glossary of 21 terms and a corresponding hierarchical taxonomy (tree diagram). These tools were developed to clarify the terminology of mental practice in music performance in order to provide a foundation for a more systematic use of the terminology in future research, as well as to assist with comprehension of the existing literature.

Download Full-text

Comparative Effect Of Mental Practice and Physical Practice On Learning Motor Skills In Volleyball

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e548052012-732 ◽

2007 ◽

Author(s):

Madhusudan P. Reddy ◽

Rajender Singh

Keyword(s):

Motor Skills ◽

Mental Practice ◽

Physical Practice ◽

Comparative Effect

Download Full-text

Skill and strategic control

Synthese ◽

10.1007/s11229-021-03053-3 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Ellen Fridland

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Empirical Evidence ◽

Mental Imagery ◽

Sports Psychology ◽

Mental Practice ◽

Strategic Control ◽

Cognitive Representations ◽

Personal Level ◽

The Right ◽

Better Than

AbstractThis paper provides an account of the strategic control involved in skilled action. When I discuss strategic control, I have in mind the practical goals, plans, and strategies that skilled agents use in order to specify, structure, and organize their skilled actions, which they have learned through practice. The idea is that skilled agents are better than novices not only at implementing the intentions that they have but also at forming the right intentions. More specifically, skilled agents are able formulate and modify, adjust and adapt their practical intentions in ways that are appropriate, effective, and flexible given their overall goals. Further, to specify the kind of action plans that are involved in strategic control, I’ll rely on empirical evidence concerning mental practice and mental imagery from sports psychology as well as evidence highlighting the systematic differences in the cognitive representations of skills between experts and non-experts. I’ll claim that, together, this evidence suggests that the intentions that structure skilled actions are practical and not theoretical, that is, that they are perceptual and motor and not abstract, amodal, or linguistic. Importantly, despite their grounded nature, these plans are still personal-level, deliberate, rational states. That is, the practical intentions used to specify and structure skilled actions are best conceived of as higher-order, motor-modal structures, which can be manipulated and used by the agent for the purpose of reasoning, deliberation, decision-making and, of course, the actual online structuring and organizing of action.

Download Full-text

BER performance analysis of FSO using hybrid-SIM technique with APD receiver over weak and strong turbulence channels

Journal of Optical Communications ◽

10.1515/joc-2020-0111 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 0 (0) ◽

Author(s):

Rajat Kumar Giri

Keyword(s):

Performance Improvement ◽

System Performance ◽

Avalanche Photodiode ◽

Free Space Optical ◽

Error Performance ◽

Strong Turbulence ◽

Meijer G Function ◽

Hermite Approximation ◽

Ber Performance ◽

Better Than

Abstract In this paper, a hybrid-subcarrier-intensity-modulation (hybrid-SIM) technique for the performance improvement of free-space-optical (FSO) communication system has been proposed. Subsequently, for further error performance improvement, avalanche photodiode (APD) based receiver is used in the proposed system. The system performance is analyzed at various atmospheric turbulence levels over weak and strong turbulence channels. The bit error rate (BER) is theoretically derived using Gauss–Hermite approximation and Meijer-G function and it is simulated in the MATLAB environment. The simulation result shows that the BER performance of hybrid-SIM is better than BPSK-SIM technique irrespective of the channel types and also the significant BER performance improvement is observed by APD receiver.

Download Full-text

Sex and Birth Order in Children's Goal Setting and Actual Performance of a Gross Motor Task

Perceptual and Motor Skills ◽

10.2466/pms.1981.53.2.663 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 53 (2) ◽

pp. 663-666 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Evelyn G. Hall ◽

Amelia M. Lee

Keyword(s):

Elementary School ◽

Birth Order ◽

Goal Setting ◽

Motor Task ◽

Complete Data ◽

School Age ◽

Gross Motor ◽

Actual Performance ◽

Elementary School Age ◽

Better Than

This study investigated the effect of birth order and sex on goal setting and actual performance by boys and girls of elementary school age on a ring-toss task. Children were asked to give a verbal estimate of the number of successful trials out of 10 they expected to complete. Data were analyzed by 2 (sex) × 2 (birth order) analyses of variance. Results indicated that firstborn boys set higher goals and performed significantly better than later-born boys, firstborn girls or later-born girls.

Download Full-text