اثرات تمركز توجه و تصويرسازي دروني و بيروني بر اكتساب و يادداري مهارت پرتاب دارت

The Effects of Internal and External Focus of Attention and Imagery on the Acquisition and Retention of Dart Throwing Skill

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of internal and external focus of attention and imagery instructions on the acquisition and retention of dart throwing skill. For this purpose, 112 healthy male students (24±1 years, 23.57 & 25.06 internal and external imagery ability) of Shahid Rajaee Teacher Training university were selected to participate in this study. All subjects were divided in two experiments (8 groups). In one experiment, subjects performed either focus of attention training or imagery training with internal or external instructions. In the second experiment, subjects performed combination of attentional focus and imagery training. Based on the attentional focus and imagery training, each experiment was divided to four groups (n=14). All subjects participated in 5 training sessions included 90 trails per session. After the completion of acquisition phase, the post-test and retention test were performed. Analysis of variance with repeated measures in two experiments indicated significant improvements in performance for all groups in acquisition phase. However there were no significant differences among groups. Data analysis revealed that the main effect of measurement periods was significant, but the main effect of groups and interaction effect of groups and measurement periods was not significant. Finally these findings suggest that either internal or external perspective of imagery and focus of attention lead to improvement in acquisition and learning of skill in novice students.