The role of imagery in physical education

Abstract

Appropriate changes in the invariants, parameters, and outputs underlying the skillful execution of the fundamental motor skills require more than physical practice. Especially in the beginning of learning (among three to seven-year-old children) the role of the cognitive processes is decisive, since it is via these processes that a child forms, through conditioning of the various sensory stimuli, the mental (motor) images for initiating the required movements. To increase this mental image formation, age-related quasi eidetic imagery applied to motor learning (AQEI) alternating with physical practice was used in this study in trying to determine 1) what changes the two different practice methods (applied quasi-eidetic imagery with physical) and physical (alone) bring to bear on image formation and on the crucial execution invariants, parameters, and outputs, 2) what differences might exist between the two methods in the observed effects, and 3) what associations might be found to exist between image formation and the execution invariants, parameters and outputs. The subjects (N = 42) were randomly selected and divided into control (CR) and experimental (EXP) groups with girts and boys almost equally represented in each group. The experimental group had both applied quasi-eidetic imagery (three times a week) and physical (twice a week) practice and the control group only physical practice (twice a week) for a total of ten weeks. Pre- and final-testing sessions were administered. The changes found in the motor images developed gradually beginning in those parts of the body used physically and mentally most frequently such as the various leg positions and displacements utilised in walking and running, as well as the appropriate displacements of the arms in all the fundamental motor skills involved. This result also supported the view, that the effects of imagery practice might be observed mainly on the position and displacement parameters. To increase the use of the force invariant in a relevant space-time relation, physical practice alternating with imagery should be employed. It seemed that, although the activation effects of imagery might be low, it nonetheless makes a positive contribution to the antedating activation of the motor units in achieving the desired level of activation required for initiating movements in accordance with the developmental level of the motor image of the skill in question.