Sport Performance as a Domain of Creative Problem Solving for Self-Organizing Performer-Environment Systems

Abstract

In this paper we discuss the role of nonlinear pedagogy in explaining and facilitating creative behaviors within the sport performance context. Some research results are also highlighted as examples of creative problem solving within sports such as martial arts and rugby union. Within the framework of nonlinear pedagogy, creative behaviors may occur as a consequence of a specific constellation of interacting constraints that impinge on the performer-environment system. The relaxation of constraints enhances the potential for exploratory behavior and enables greater fluency and flexibility, increasing the probability of discovering atypical functional solutions to a task goal. In the example of team games, we highlight that critical values of interpersonal distance in attacker-defender dyads define a region that affords high metasta- bility and reorganization of dyad actions. Here idiosyncratic performance solutions are created by immediate constraints of the system. Also, the performance context offered by the team is of utmost importance for creating possibilities for ac- tion at an individual level. In general we emphasize that analysis of the performer-environment system can provide a full account of the emergence of creative behaviors in sport performance contexts.