ArticlePloS one2022
Attention and executive control in varsity athletes engaging in strategic and static sports.
Article in PloS one, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 33 citations in OpenAlex.
- Determining Cognitive Performance in Athletes: A Systematic Review Focused on Methodology of Applying Cognitive Tests.Scandinavian journal of psychology · 2025Pooled it
- Effects of football training on cognitive performance in children and adolescents: a meta-analytic review.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Pooled it
- A Critical Examination of the Usefulness of Taxonomies for Comparing Cognitive Functions Across Sports.European journal of sport science · 2026Article
- Neural Efficiency and Sensorimotor Adaptations in Swimming Athletes: A Systematic Review of Neuroimaging and Cognitive-Behavioral Evidence for Performance and Wellbeing.Brain sciences · 2026Review
- Sport-specific demands on sustained attention in elite athletes: a novel within-subjects approach for investigation.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2026Article
- Multidimensional cognitive functioning across sport classifications: insights from high-performance athletes.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- The effects of competitive trait anxiety on attentional bias in adolescent tennis players.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Attentional network efficiency in elite biathletes and cross-country skiers.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2026Article
- The benefits of chronic sport participation and acute exercise on mental health and executive functioning in adolescents.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- The role of cerebellar-cortical connectivity in modulating attentional abilities: insight from football athletes.Behavioral and brain functions : BBF · 2025Article
- Association between the attentional network efficiency and change of direction speed ability in young male Indian footballers.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2025Article
- Visual attention and response time to distinguish athletes from non-athletes: A virtual reality study.PloS one · 2025Article
- Football training vs. martial arts training: How are they related to executive function skills in 5-6-year-old boys?Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Cognitive-coordination training: impact on sport-specific physical fitness and technical skill of adolescent basketball athletes.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- The impact of badminton participation on attention control in college students: the mediating role of flow experience.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Effects of self-discrepancy on emotional information processing in competitive tennis players.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Neurocognitive performance of badminton players at different competitive levels in visuospatial attention tasks.Experimental brain research · 2024Article
- Identifying the Qualities of Attention and the Attentional Style in Indoor Team Sports: A Gender Comparison.Brain sciences · 2024Article
- Enhanced Cognitive Inhibition in Table Tennis Athletes: Insights from Color-Word and Spatial Stroop Tasks.Brain sciences · 2024Article
- Cognition in elite soccer players: a general model.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Examining non-sport-related cognitive tasks of attention and executive control in skilled athletes may provide insight into the acquisition of highly specific skills developed in experts as well as help identify successful performance in sport. Through a cross-sectional design, this study examined performance on aspects of attention and executive control among varsity athletes playing soccer (strategic sport) or track & field (static sport) using a computerized test of attention and executive control. Ninety-seven university athletes participating in soccer (n = 50) or track and field (n = 47) were included in the study. Domains of attention and executive control were examined using the Attention Network Test-Interactions (ANT-I). Mean reaction time (RT) and intra-individual variability (IIV) were compared between groups as measures of performance speed and performance stability respectively. Soccer players demonstrated overall faster RTs (p = 0.0499; ηp2 = .04) and higher response accuracy (p = .021, d = .48) on the ANT-I compared to track and field athletes. Faster RTs were observed for soccer players when presented with an alerting tone (p = .029, d = .45), valid orienting cue (p = .019, d = .49) and incongruent flanker (p = .031, d = .45). No significant group differences were observed in IIV (p = .083, d = .36). Athletes engaging in strategic sports (i.e., soccer) demonstrated faster performance under test conditions that required higher vigilance and conflict resolution. These findings suggest that engagement in strategic sports is associated with enhanced performance on non-sport-related cognitive tasks of attention and executive control.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.