Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

8-1986

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Education

Major Professor

Patricia Beitel

Committee Members

Mark Hector, Ralph Jones, Craig Wrisberg

Abstract

The primary purpose of this study was to examine the visual search abilities of experienced and novice women basketball players utilizing a visual search paradigm. An attempt was made to: (a) compare the speed and accuracy of detection and recall ability between both types of players, and (b) compare the visual search performance of experienced and novice basketball players in structured and unstructured basketball situations. A secondary purpose of this study was to examine how experienced and novice basketball players control their visual search process (target or context) through the adoption of Prinz's et al. (1974) hurdle paradigm.

Thirty female college students consisting of 15 experienced and 15 novice basketball players served as subjects. Sport slides consisting of 32 structured and 32 unstructured basketball situations were used as the stimuli in this study. Sixteen of each situation, structured or unstructured, contained a target item (basketball). Sixteen of each situation contained a hurdle item (orange triangle). Each subject scanned the sport slide projected for a 5-second period. Speed and accuracy of ball detection were measured by the subject response to presence or absence of the target item (basketball) hy depressing a yes or no key positioned in front of the subject. After the 5-second viewing, players recalled as many players as possible on a grid depicting the basketball court.

Two randomized repeated measures design MCVA models were used as the basis for the analysis of the three dependent variables and the testing of the research hypotheses. The findings were that: (a) visual search performance of experienced players, their overall speed of target detection and player recall, were significantly superior than that of novice players, (b) the overall accuracy in detecting the target item was similar for both experienced and novice players, (c) both groups of players could accurately detect and recall a structured play better than an unstructured play, with the experienced player being superior in both situations, and (d) the speed of detection of both groups of players was not affected ty the difference in structured and unstructured plays. The finding pertaining to the control of visual search was that the presence or absence of the hurdle item did not affect speed by experience level or accuracy of detection, indicating that the visual search of both experienced and novice players may have operated under target control.

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