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Top1. Introduction
Pre-performance routines (PPRs) entails the performance of determined motions before an action and are often executed in sports for the purpose of removing stress or raising concentration. PPRs have been defined as physical and psychological preparation before performing tasks (Cotterill, 2010). In the area of sport science and psychology, their effectiveness has been experimentally reported in various sports, such as basketball free throws (Lonsdale & Tam, 2008), water polo penalty shots (Marlow et al., 1998), serves in volleyball (Velentzas et al., 2011), golf (Cotterill et al., 2010), and football (Mesagno & Mullane-Grant, 2010). Moreover, in the area of neuroscience and brain science, studies have analyzed the difference in the activating parts of the brain between experts and novices using functional magnetic resonance imaging through the computer simulation tasks of archery (Kim et al., 2008) and golf (Milton et al., 2007).
The analysis of results of PPRs using a simple brainwaves sensor were previously reported (Hiraishi, 2017). In that paper, concentration levels were measured while throwing given objects at specific targets, such as the free throw in basketball and darts games. First, the concentration levels in basketball free throws were analyzed and the differences between experts and novices recorded. Subsequently, the influence of PPRs in dart games was investigated. A concentration-stabilizing phenomenon was discovered before each throw and the phenomenon appears more conspicuously in experts and when PPRs were performed. This implies that a phenomenon similar to PPR exists in experts, and leads to the effects of stress removal or increased concentration, both of which are the purpose of PPRs, and is similar to the stabilizing of concentration which could be a result of modifications in brainwaves.
The heart rate during a PPR was also analyzed (Hiraishi, 2020). Heart rate data has been used as a parameter of health or mental workload in many fields. Heart rate variability (Delliaux et al., 2019) is a well-known biological phenomenon that reflects autonomic nerve activity. Low Frequency (LF), which reflects sympathetic nerve activity, and High Frequency (HF), which reflects parasympathetic nerve activity, are obtained through spectrum analysis. The LF/HF ratio, which represents their index, is used as a parameter for assessing the stress level (Pomeranz et al., 1985). There is an existing case study that shows the analysis of the relationship between heart rate and shot accuracy in basketball (Ardigò et al., 2018). Similar to previous studies (Hiraishi, 2017; Hiraishi, 2018), in that study (Hiraishi, 2020), a PPR in a darts game was focused upon, heart rate changes during the PPR was analyzed, and the timing of heartbeat and throwing was investigated. The result showed that darts game scores tend to improve by throwing immediately after a heartbeat.
PPRs are very attractive and well-known techniques in sports. However, the mechanisms by which PPRs accomplish their effects are not clear (Cotterill, 2010). PPRs are unique to individuals (Cotterill et al., 2010), and a general method for configuring PPRs does not exist. Therefore, they are designed by trial and error through consultation and discussion among specialists and players (Marlow et al., 2011). However, these analysis results of brainwaves and heart rate indicate that we can objectively determine the types of behavioral sequences that are appropriate for PPRs by determining concentration levels by monitoring of brainwaves or heartbeat. In addition, we show that once a PPR is known to be effective, it can be trained to achieve greater stabilization of concentration or throwing immediately after a heartbeat.
In this paper, two types of a cognitive support tool for PPRs in darts game have been introduced. A tool using a simple brainwaves sensor has been designed, and allows the determination of the baseline level of concentration, and the concentration-stabilizing phenomenon on a tablet computer. Another tool has been developed on a smart watch with a heart rate sensor. The smart watch indicated heartbeat as a “beep” sound to a user. The effectiveness of this tool was verified in several experiments.
This paper is organized as follows: Section 2 introduces the simple brainwaves sensor that we adopted. Section 3 describes the support tool using simple brainwaves sensor and shows the effectiveness of the tool. Section 4 presents the analyses for heart rate change and timing of heartbeat and throwing. Section 5 explains the support tool based on heartbeat and details the effectiveness of the tool. Section 6 concludes this paper.