Vicky GottwaldBangor University · School of Sport, Health and Exercise Sciences
Vicky Gottwald
PhD
About
14
Publications
9,568
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158
Citations
Citations since 2017
Introduction
Additional affiliations
September 2011 - present
Publications
Publications (14)
In the current experiment, we examined optimal focus for novices during a movement sequence in which performance was measured on accurate movement form/technique. A novel gymnastics routine was practiced under either an internal skill-relevant, internal skill-irrelevant, external, or no attention focus. Retention and transfer tests were then comple...
Research suggests that implicit strategies adopted during learning help prevent breakdown of automatic processes and subsequent performance decrements associated with the presence of pressure. According to the Constrained Action Hypothesis, automaticity of movement is promoted when adopting an external focus of attention. The purpose of the current...
Abstract
Whilst benefits of an external focus are shown to govern several characteristics of skill execution, specificity theory indicates that sources of afferent information most useful to performance execution are typically prioritised during processing.
Objectives
We investigated whether an internal focus facilitates performance when pertinent...
Recent empirical research has revealed differences in functional capacity between the upper and lower visual fields (VFs), with the lower VF exhibiting superiority in visual perception skills. Similarly, functional differences between the left and right hemispheres elicit a predominance for visuospatial processing in the left visual field (left VF)...
Via three experiments, we investigated heightened anxiety's effect on the offline planning and online correction of upper-limb target-directed aiming movements. In Experiment 1, the majority of task trials allowed for the voluntary distribution of offline planning and online correction to achieve task success, while a subset of cursor jump trials n...
Recent expertise development studies have used retrospective recall methods to explore developmental biographies and/or practice histories of current or past athletes. This methodological approach limits the generalizability and trustworthiness of findings. As such, a gap exists for research exploring key multidisciplinary features in athlete devel...
For the first time, the present study investigated the combined role of selfcontrol, motivation, and mental effort in predicting undergraduate students’ learning from a two-hour presentation-format higher education lecture. The study comprised 62 students, in a final-year BSc undergraduate Sports Coaching lecture, who completed questionnaires measu...
This study aimed to extend the notion of the theory of event coding as an explanation of action anticipation in expert sport performers. This was achieved by investigating the degree with which automatic anticipation depends on the ecological congruency between the perceived action and its distal effect. In a novel approach, the representational mo...
Research suggests an external focus of attention (EFOA) promotes effective performance and learning compared to an internal focus of attention (IFOA), with explanations proposed by the constrained action hypothesis (CAH) and OPTIMAL theory of motor learning. Specifically, it is proposed that adopting an EFOA prevents the constraining of normally au...
We investigated for the first time whether the principles of specificity could be extended to the psychological construct of anxiety and whether any benefits of practicing with anxiety are dependent on the amount of exposure and timing of that exposure in relation to where in learning the exposure occurs. In Experiment 1, novices practiced a discre...
Redundant cues for attractiveness in humans have been identified, but the idea of multiple systems displaying different socially-relevant traits has yet to be extensively examined. We compared the accuracy with which observers could identify socially-relevant information of female targets, both from static images of their faces, and from point-ligh...
Projects
Projects (4)
To determine if an especial skill can be depicted by the neuro-mechanical mechanisms of a skill, moving on from the changes in visual contextual cues of an especial skill, to expand and develop the current knowledge surrounding the theory.
This project forms part of a collaborative national talent identification and selection programme with the Welsh national governing body for olympic weightlifting. As the first part in a series of multidisciplinary investigations, the first study aims to determine the demographics, physiological and psychosocial factors, as well as and practice and training histories, that differentiate performance improvements in junior weightlifting athletes. The second study is a retrospective enquiry into the biographical development of elite British weightlifting athletes, and aims to investigate the demographical, psychosocial, and practice and training histories that differentiate elite performers from their non-elite counterparts.
