Automatic detection of peripheral stimuli in shooters and handball players: an event-related potential study

Bela Petro,István Czigler,Csaba Ökrös,Petia Kojouharova,Zsófia Anna Gaál,Tibor Kökény,Ágota Lénárt

doi:10.1007/s00221-021-06071-2

Abstract

This study examined the practice-related sensitivity of automatic change detection. The visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) component of event-related potentials was compared in handball players and in sport shooters. Whereas effective performance in handball requires processing of a wide visual field, effective performance in shooting requires concentration to a narrow field. Thus, we hypothesized larger sensitivity to peripheral stimuli violating the regularity of sequential stimulation in handball players. Participants performed a tracking task, while task-irrelevant checkerboard patterns (a frequent and an infrequent type) were presented in the lateral parts of the visual field. We analyzed the vMMN, a signature of automatic detection of violating sequential regularity, and sensory components (P1, N1, and P2). We obtained larger vMMN in the handball players’ group indicating larger sensitivity to peripheral stimuli. These results suggest the plasticity of the automatic visual processing, i.e., it can adapt to sport-specific demands, and this can be captured even in a short experimental session in the laboratory.

Highlights

Stimuli violating the regularity of sequential stimulation are automatically registered, even if such stimuli are different from the task-relevant events
The automatic registration of deviant stimuli is indicated by the mismatch responses of event-related potentials (ERPs) in the auditory, in the visual and in the somatosensory modality (e.g., Shinozaki et al 1998; Shen et al 2018)
◂Fig. 2 ERPs to the standard and deviant stimuli over 6 posterior electrode locations in the two groups (a), deviant minus standard difference potentials over the 6 posterior electrode locations (b), ERPs to deviant and standard stimuli, and the deviant minus standard difference potential at FZ location (c) reference electrode was placed on the nose tip, and the ground electrode on the forehead (AFz)

Summary

Introduction

Stimuli violating the regularity of sequential stimulation are automatically registered, even if such stimuli are different from the task-relevant events. The automatic registration of deviant stimuli is indicated by the mismatch responses of event-related potentials (ERPs) in the auditory (for reviews, see Garrido et al 2009; Näätänen et al 2011), in the visual (for reviews, see Czigler 2007; Kimura et al 2011; Stefanics et al 2014) and in the somatosensory modality (e.g., Shinozaki et al 1998; Shen et al 2018). One of the aims of the present study was to investigate whether expert knowledge could modify the effect of this kind of automatic change detection. To this end, we compared the sensitivity of vMMN between two groups of experienced athletes: handball players and sport shooters. For illustrative purposes at tables and figures, we created the parietal-occipital (PO: PO3, POZ, PO4) and the occipital (O: O1, OZ, O2) ROIs

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