Fatemeh Keshvari; Alireza Farsi; Behrooz Abdoli
Abstract
Introduction: This study aimed to investigate alpha power in successful and unsuccessful free throws of elite and novice basketball players.Methods: The current research was quasi-experimental and was implemented in a time series design. Two Elite (10 participants with a mean age of 22.25 ± ...
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Introduction: This study aimed to investigate alpha power in successful and unsuccessful free throws of elite and novice basketball players.Methods: The current research was quasi-experimental and was implemented in a time series design. Two Elite (10 participants with a mean age of 22.25 ± 1.34) and Novice (10 participants with a mean age of 22.55 ± 1.80) groups participated voluntarily. The data were measured using 28 electrodes from a 32-channel wireless device and were analyzed using the repeated measures analysis of variance test (p≥0.05).Results: The alpha power of the elite group was higher than the novice group (P=0.001). The successful throws showed lower alpha power than unsuccessful throws (P=0.006). In the comparison of the two groups, the alpha power in the unsuccessful throws of the elite group was higher than in their successful throws (p=0.001), but no difference was observed between the alpha power of the successful and unsuccessful throws of the novice group (p=0.584). The alpha power during the execution time of the free throw task was higher than the pre-execution time (p<0.005), but there was no difference between the first and second pre-execution times (p=1.000). The results of the present study showed that the elite group had higher cortical activity than the novice group in all electrodes (p<0.001).Conclusion: The findings show that the elite group performed the task with less cortical complexity by inhibiting irrelevant information. In addition, the decrease in alpha power in successful throws indicates an increase in activation of cerebral cortex and an increase in concentration, so that the task can be performed with fewer neural resources.
Ali Yaghoobian; Fazlallah Bagherzadeh; Rasool Hemayattalab; Davood Homaniyan
Abstract
Introduction: Recently, the matter of the influence of mental skills on sports skills performance has become very important. The current research aimed to evaluate and compare the mental preparation of the male fencers of the Iranian national team and the elite male fencers of the world.Methods: The ...
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Introduction: Recently, the matter of the influence of mental skills on sports skills performance has become very important. The current research aimed to evaluate and compare the mental preparation of the male fencers of the Iranian national team and the elite male fencers of the world.Methods: The current research method was experimental. The statistical population of this research included the fencers of the national teams of Iran, Hungary, America, Russia, France, and Ukraine. The research samples were 58 fencers from selected countries. To measure the mental skills of fencers, the original version of the Ottawa Mental Skills Assessment Tool (OMSAT-3) questionnaire was used. To compare the mental skills of athletes from different countries, the Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) and Bonferroni's post hoc test were used.Results: The results showed that all elite male fencers achieved the highest scores in foundation mental skills including self-confidence, goal setting, and commitment, and the lowest scores were related to refocusing, focusing, and stress control skills. Also, the highest and the lowest scores of mental skills in this research were related to self-confidence and refocusing skills, respectively. Russian fencers scored the highest in all mental skills and Iranian fencers scored the lowest in the stress control skill.Conclusion: Based on the results of the research, fencers have less proficiency in two sub-skills of cognitive psychological and psychosomatic skills compared with the foundation mental skills. The fencers had lower strength in terms of the mental skill of focusing, refocusing, and stress control. Iranian and non-Iranian fencers were weaker in mental skills of stress control and refocusing.
jafar Belali voshmehsara; Saeed Arsham; Shahab Parvinpour; Fazlollah Bagherzadeh
Abstract
One of the key factors for success in sport competitions is the ability to predict the movements of an opponent before performing them. The aim of the present study was to determine the effect of choking under pressure on predictive performance and to compare it between elite and novice fencers. In this ...
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One of the key factors for success in sport competitions is the ability to predict the movements of an opponent before performing them. The aim of the present study was to determine the effect of choking under pressure on predictive performance and to compare it between elite and novice fencers. In this quasi-experimental study, the subjects included 15 elite athletes of the youth fencing national team (16-20 years old) and 15 students from University of Tehran (18-22 years old) as novice athletes who were assigned to two groups by convenience sampling method. Prior to the test, 15 clips out of 100 video clips of different attacks on different parts of the fencers' body were performed and recorded by two professional members of the Iran National Fencing Team. After each video clip was stopped (before the sword hit the opponent's body), an answer sheet appeared on the screen and the subjects had to predict the location where the sword hit the opponent. The present study was conducted under high and normal pressure conditions. The high pressure condition was applied by the presence of a national team coach as the evaluator and in the non-pressure condition, the efforts were made without the presence of the evaluator. The results of mixed factor analysis of variance showed that the main effect of condition and group was significant but the interactive effect of condition and group was not significant. Bonferroni post hoc test results also showed that those players who were in normal condition had better predictive performance than those who were under the pressure condition; also, elite players had better predictive performance than novices in both conditions (P<0.05). But generally, choking under pressure decreases predictive performance in both elite and novice fencers.
