Using Video for More Effective Feedback in Training

Keith LyonsNovember 2001

Credo

The real impact of sports science at a practical level is in giving coaches the freedom to be coaches.

Wayne Greensmith and Bill Sweetnam

Starting Points• We have been influenced by our teachers and

coaches.

• The world class environment has opened up immense amounts of information that we have to manage and integrate.

• Digital convergence has offered us unprecedented technological tools.

Starting Points

• We are all trying to move our coaching from ‘good practice’ to ‘best practice’.

• Long-term sustainable development: Performance, Potential and Start are inextricably linked in a performance pathway.

Visual Literacy…

An ability to comprehend and create visuals in a variety of moving and static media in order to communicate effectively.

Teachers have long known that …

Visuals help children comprehend unfamiliar vocabulary and add meaning to stories in ways that words alone cannot.

Using Video for More Effective Feedback

• Some psychological issues.• Some educational technology ideas.• Some logistical issues.• Appliance of coaching science and the art

of coaching.• A question of perspective.

Coaching Contexts

The training environment

Preparation for competition

Competition

Analysis of performance data

Dissemination and education.

Psychological Issues

Feedback

We need to distinguish between the role feedback plays in relatively permanent effects on performance (learning) and the temporary effects (performance). It is important not to confuse the two!

Richard Schmidt

• Frequent augmented feedback can degrade learning!

• We must distinguish between learning and performance.

• Feedback only if learner’s error outside predefined band of correctness.

Positive Effects of Feedback

• Indicates errors.• Directs corrections.• Guides behaviour to target.• Motivates and energises.

Negative Aspects of Feedback

• Becomes part of task when presented frequently.

• Blocks error-detection?• Encourages too many trial-by-trial

corrections that could degrade capability to produce stable behaviour.

Effectiveness of video learning?The effectiveness of video learning varies from person to person. Perception is strongly affected by what we expect or are ‘set’ to perceive. This influences both what we select and how we organise and interpret it.

Perception organisation is affected not only by the stimulus but by the perceiver’s past experiences, present interests, and needs.

What kind of information?

• Qualitative

• Quantitative

Volleyball example

• Peter Hastie’s use of video with an Under-16 volleyball group.

• Motor skill acquisition:– Post-event: “molecular view of performance”.– Reinforcement of concurrent feedback.– Systematic analysis

Volleyball Example (continued)

• Maximising use of video: distinguish general outcomes from specific outcomes. Coach pre-views to ensure specific feedback or selection of cues.

• Importance of cueing attention for responsiveness of players.

Synchronous

and Asynchronous

Use of Video

Train

Watch

Train

Asynchronous Environments:

Away from the Training Session

Plan

Watch

Train

PlanSelect behaviours

Watch

Review selected behaviours

Train

Permanent video record

Permanent video record

Stimulated recall

Synchronous Learning Environments:

at the Training Session

Watch

Train

Immediate repetition of

task

Watch

Train

Short-term memory

Dilemma!

Peter Jensen (1997), National Institute of Mental Health

Extensive exposure to television and video games may promote development of brain systems that scan and shift attention at the expense of those that focus attention.

1. Quick changes of image activate the brain’s ‘orienting response’: it is hard to resist them!

2. The earlier children acquire a passive TV habit, the more likely attention span will not develop normally.

Implications?

• Children need much more time in self-directed doing than viewing!

• Practicing concentration and attention skills is best done through concrete experiences in the 3-D world.

• Don’t fill every non-training minute: otherwise how will children develop intrinsic motivation?

Can coaches train perceptual and decision-making abilities?

Ability?

• Some experts seems to have visual defects!

• “After 70 years of research there are few conclusive links between performance on standard visual tests and athletic performance” (Starkes and Lindley, 1994).

Expert?

The classification of an expert, at least by researchers on expertise, appear to be quite arbitrary and that the criterion used to define expertise varies substantially from researcher to researcher and from study to study.

Abernethy, Thomas and Thomas (1993)

Expert?

Experts are frequently found to be surprisingly poor on some component skills but are able to compensate for any such weaknesses with exceptional capability on one or more other components.

Video and Occlusion

Starkes and Lindley (1991)

• Women’s basketball study• Optimal offensive move for ball carrier• Shoot, dribble, pass?• Occluded at point of decision• Useful at intermediate skill level to enhance

speed of decision-making?

Advantages of this Approach?

• Does not take up on-court time.• Coach does not need to be present.• Learning is self paced.• Can be used all year.• Minimal equipment required.

Lindley (1987)

Video simulations are probably the best for training decision making …

Even with just 90 minutes of video training over 4 days, intermediate skill level players reduced their decision-making times.

Anticipation

Fery and Crognier (2001)

• Information available in opponent’s stroke movements in tennis?

• Occlusion.• Prediction.

Williams (2000)

• Skilled athletes do not possess superior visual systems but skill differences are evident in cognitive dimensions of performance.

• Experts encode and retrieve information due to long-term memory structures.

• Anticipation.

Ward and Williams (2000)

• At what age do soccer players develop perceptual skill?

• Report of work with 9 to 17 year olds.• Shown video simulations with occlusion to

measure anticipatory performance.

Simulation

• Does it mimic real-world task?• Realism and expertise of subject?• Lessons from flight simulators?• Extreme environments where task demands

often exceed perceptual and cognitive capabilities? (Tactical air missions).

• Virtual reality?• Reality rooms?

The World’s first Reality Center™, SGI Reading, UK

First Reality Room in Oil & Gas –

Texaco’s Visualization Center, Houston

First Real-time Interactive Planetarium -Hayden Planetarium, American Museum of Natural History, New York

First Solid screen cubic environment -Foundation of the Hellenic World, Athens, Greece

First 170 seat interactive entertainment Dome - Seoul, Korea

State of the art warplane cockpit system used by pilots to aim missiles with their eyes now used to improve dyslexics’ eye-fixing and tracking.

Learning a Motor Skill?

Gabriele Wulf

How can skills be:• Acquired faster?• Retained better?• Transferred?

How can we use implicit and explicit learning?

Keith Davids

• Visual demonstration and verbal instructions• Slow motion and real time analysis• The structural organisation of practice• Skill acquisition and deliberate practice• Visual search strategies• Cue usage

Internal and External Focus

• Thinking about one’s actions during movement execution can be detrimental to performance.

• Directing a learner’s attention to the effects of their actions can be more effective than directing their attention to the movements themselves.

Implications for Video Feedback?

• Can we use video images to promote an external focus?

• Can we promote discovery learning with such feedback so that athletes develop implicit learning?

Logistics 1

• Effective use of video requires time for coach and athlete to become familiar with technology and information presented.

• This is video self-confrontation!

• It requires the management of learning environments to maximise the impact of video.

Can you see?

• How comfortably you can see a projected image is a function of the screen’s width and height factored against the audience’s viewing angle and distance from the screen.

• There are guidelines available.

Screens

• Centre of screen no more than 20 0 above the eye level of any viewer.

• All viewers should be seated within 300 of the projection axis and never more than 450 off axis.

Size of Audience and Size of ScreenAudience Size of Screen Distance from

First Row

1 to 4 21”5 to 9 29”

10 to 14 37”15 to 35 60” 10’36 to 50 6’ 12’

51 to 140 10’ 20’141 to 220 12’ 25’221 to 400 16’ 33’

Subtended Angle

Prime seat!

2/3 way back

Impact of subtended angle on viewing experience?

Very Involving

Not Involving

Does size matter?

• Evidence to suggest screen size affects attention.

• Evidence that size affects evaluation: the bigger the screen the more positive the evaluation.

• Are larger images more persuasive and memorable?

Evidence from instructional media research indicates that technologically influenced coaching works best when an athlete is

empowered with decision-making authority under the guidance of a knowledgeable

coach.

Shyness?

Since the 1970s, 40% of adult Americans report that shyness presents a problem in their lives.

Shyness is a discomfort or inhibition in interpersonal situations that interferes with interpersonal and professional goals.

Monitoring the Impact of Video?

• We need long-term studies to help us understand athletes’ transitions from novice to expert.

• We need to reflect upon the impact our use of video has upon our own coaching style and monitor knowledge and performance gains.

Video Modelling and Video Prompting

Video Self Modelling

• A procedure that uses carefully planned and edited positive self-images with the goal of changing the frequency or quality of a person’s behaviour.

• A short video of two to three minutes viewed by student over two week period and forms basis of monitoring.

• Requirement: person wants to change and desired change is realistic.

Types of Self Modelling

• Feedforward (Peter Dowrick)

• Positive self-review

Video Modelling and Video Prompting

• video modelling is defined as a videotape of a model completing the total chained task and the participants viewing the model prior to each training session.

• video prompting is defined as a video demonstration shown during a training session to participants after they have failed to perform a a correct response within a designated time period.

Norman and Collins (2001)

Video Modelling

• Linda Haymes and Stephanie Martin: skill building and improving performance. Research with autism. Production of effective resources.

• Liisa Neumann: shortening development gap? Low tech solution.

• Keefe: success at correct point in evolution of drill can enhance and supplement learning.

Importance of video from perspective of the participant

Behavioural Intervention

• Shipley-Benamou, Lutzker and Taubman: task analysis of behavioural steps and sequences then video created from participant’s point of view. Behavioural change evident one month later.

Critical IncidentsA critical incident is highly compressed case study that poses a problem but offers no preferred solution.

Aim: to trigger problem-solving discussions.

Instruction and Demonstration?

• The coach is responsible for teaching the athlete what to do, how to do it well.

• Visual demonstration.• Verbal instruction.• Coach’s pre-practice impact?• Paradox: we know a lot about augmented

feedback but very little about pre-practice!

Recent Research

• Coaches should provide clear instruction as to the task goal and provide feedback that is appropriate to the instructed goal.

• Instructions should relate to the task goal and not necessarily the mechanical means to produce the movement.

• Allow and expect error and variability early on in learning as long as athletes know they have made an error.

Recent Research (continued)

• Although there are general features of a movement that define skilled performance these templates do not generalise well across individuals. Individually based templates may be more appropriate.

• Do not confuse training with learning!• Young children benefit more from visual

rather than verbal instruction.

Recent Research (continued)

• The relationship of explicit and implicit learning processes: individuals learn to respond effectively to certain aspects of skill without being aware of it and without being instructed to learn.

• In stressful conditions, explicit rule-based instructions may be harmful.

• Some athletes may focus on mechanics of movement and hinder acquisition. Keep pre-practice explicit information to a minimum!

Recent Research (continued)

• Pre-practice information can direct an early learner’s movement strategy. This may not always be most appropriate approach. Discovery may be more effective.

• Encourage task environment experience and encourage exploration and variability … so long as sufficient error information is available.

Recent Research (continued)

• Skill level determines what information athletes gather from demonstration.

• Providing error information is vitally important early in skill acquisition. It encourages new behaviours… so long as athlete is not attempting this from intrinsic feedback.

• Direct attention to external effects of the action rather than the limbs.

Recent Research (continued)

• Challenge: discover ways of facilitating behaviour change in early acquisition by encouraging early variability in the movement response and resisting the influence of preferred yet undesirable movement patterns.

• Withhold instruction early in acquisition to encourage variability.

Recent Research (continued)

• Feeding back on movement should be as simple as possible and should give information about goal attainment. Error information should be easily obtainable to determine goal achievement and effective implementation of pre-practice information.

• Television cameras implanted in ceiling of indoor pitch to enable coaches to use instant video replays via large screen.

• Access to Prozone tracking.• Video playback facilities on 11 outdoor pitches

either at pitch or in seminar rooms nearby.• Video viewing library.• Analysis facility

Wilkinson’s £50m plan to beat world

Partnerships?

• Robert Baker (golf coach)“I tried to show Ernie his swing several times

on the video. His right arm keeps getting caught behind his body on the downswing. But he is not prepared to work on it … that is why he is so far behind.”

June 2000.

Key Issues

• Investment in video for augmented information.

• Permanent record.• Differentiate and individualise.• Hook attention.• Stimulate learning.• Trigger change.