Correlation between visual disembedding and basketball shooting by male and female varsity college athletes.

Abstract

The delineation of visual attributes related to the qualiry of athletic performance is not yet clearly established. Research suggccts that basketball shooting performance is meaningfully related to distance perception ( 3 ) and dynamic visual acuity ( I ) , while relarively unrelated to measures of depth perception ( 4 ) and visual imagery ( 5 ) . Other properties such as visual disembedding have yet to be considered in relation to successful basketball shooting. Visual disembedding refers to the ability to break u p an organized visual field in order to keep a part of it separate from its surroundings. The task is static like those used for depth perception and imagery and is c!aimed to be the core trait of globs!-analytic cognitive style ( 6 ) . T o estimate the correlation between efficiency of basketball shooting and ability to disembed a complex visual field. 1 1 male (M,,, , = 20.7 yr., SD = 1.01) , and 9 female (M... = 20.5. SD = 1.93) sophomore and junior varsity basketball players, enrolled at Florida State University were administered the Group Hidden-figures Test, an adaptation of the Gottschaldt Figures Test ( 2 ) . The task required subjects to determine which of five simple figures was embedded in a more comp'ex pattern. The test was administered midway in the basketball season. Scores were correlated with the seasonal fieldgoal and free-throw shooring efficiency of each subject. Efficiency ratings were the ratio of successful shots to the total attempts during competition. A minimum of 20 and 1 0 attempts in the field-goal and free-throw caregories respectively were established as criteria for including subjects' data. Mean number of field-goal attempts = 184.3, SD = 115.1 for the males, and 138.6. SD = 72.4 for the females; mean number of freethrow attempts = 47.3, SD = 20.9 for the males, and M = 60.2, SD = 34.9 for the females. The Group Hidden-figures Test scores were not significantly correlated with either percentages of free throws (males -.41; females -.05) or field goals (males .16; females --.21). While a number of competition variables might be considered, these calculations clearly suggest that the ability to disembed a static visual field is not a variable of concern in the understanding of the dynamic visual properties which relate to basketball shooting.