Movement imagery, observation, and skill

Abstract

Movement skill is essential to human development. Throughout our lives we not only learn, and acquire, new motor skills but also refine existing ones, allowing us to become more efficient in our movements. The necessity for physical practice in achieving skilled movement is wellestablished. In this regard, sport participants and musicians comprise a useful group to consider in that they are highly motivated and spend many hours physically practicing to improve specific movements that will determine a significant proportion of the outcome of their performance. Skilled individuals from these disciplines will have also experienced extensive practice over time and can, therefore, demonstrate relatively permanent patterns of skilled behaviour. Of particular interest to this chapter, however, is that many performers of sport and music regularly engage in additional, more covert, rehearsals of their chosen skill. There is emerging evidence that these rehearsal behaviours may also contribute to practice effects in acquiring motor skill. Within the sport sciences, two of these more covert techniques, imagery and observational learning, have been extensively considered for skill acquisition, maintenance, and performance. It has been suggested that they can help learners acquire a ‘mental blueprint or cognitive plan’ (Morris et al. 2005 p. 216) of the action intended to be performed. The sport psychology and motor control literature provides strong support for the effectiveness of both applied techniques, with regard to movement skill, and it is generally assumed that these processes are able to contribute to the overall skill profile. However, despite their widespread use, there is a lack of a clear understanding of the efficacy of both approaches with regard to skill. As a result, procedures vary considerably, creating doubt about their contribution to movement abilities. In this chapter, therefore, we will review literature demonstrating evidence that movement imagery and observation can modulate skill, the central tenet being the extent to which these two processes are able to contribute to some of the plastic adaptations normally associated with physical practice. The direct empirical literature in this area is new and somewhat sparse. Therefore, we will draw on indirect markers of plasticity and skill. We will also propose that consideration of the extent of similarity within brain activity processes between physical practice, imagery, and action observation can inform debate, and allow for predictions to be made, on the efficacy of imagery and observation intervention techniques purporting to develop skill. In summary, we will consider how two covert processes, with no discernable movement, may contribute to relatively permanent change in brain structures and function similar to those seen following physical practice. We will consider briefly the neuroscientific processes thought to be involved in movement skill acquisition and modulation. We recognize that plastic changes can occur solely through physical practice, as has been shown clearly through research with rodents (e.g., Kliem et al. 2002). However, it is more probable that, in musicians and sports performers,change represents a combination of the contribution from physical and ‘mental’ practice behaviours. Therefore, in the following section, we do not disaggregate the two processes. As affect can been shown to influence skill, we will also consider this with movement imagery and observation interventions.