Specific features of cognitive skill development in athletes of situational sports

Abstract

Background and Study Aim. The formation of cognitive skills in athletes engaged in situational sports follows specific patterns determined by the characteristics of gameplay or competitive activity, as well as by the influence of psychophysiological and individual traits. An equally important factor in the development of cognitive skills is the training process, which incorporates specialized exercises and techniques aimed at stimulating cognitive processes, situational analysis, spatial imagination, and adaptive behavior. This study aimed to identify the peculiarities of cognitive skill formation in athletes participating in situational sports. Material and Methods. The study involved 97 participants, including 80 qualified male athletes with 5 to 9 years of training experience, representing three sports: football (n = 26, age 15.3 ± 0.49 years), judo (n = 31, age 16.6 ± 2.83 years), and taekwondo (n = 23, age 16.5 ± 1.90 years), and 17 boys (age 8.71 ± 1.16 years) who were not engaged in organized sports but expressed interest in doing so. Psychophysiological testing was conducted using tablet-based applications on iOS devices: the "Spatial Perception" test was used to assess spatial perception, and the "TestSTMemory" was used to evaluate short-term visual memory. Mathematical and statistical analyses were conducted using RStudio. Linear discriminant analysis was applied to differentiate athletes by sport. Wilks’ Lambda was used to evaluate the quality of the discriminant model. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed to identify variables with significant intergroup differences. The Kruskal–Wallis test was used to assess the reliability of differences between the studied groups. Results. The results of the short-term visual memory test indicate that the differences between the study groups, as assessed by the Kruskal–Wallis test, were not statistically significant (p > 0.05). In the spatial perception test, statistically significant differences were observed only at the fourth stage, in the percentage of errors (p-value = 0.01). The results of the discriminant analysis show that, when constructing a linear discriminant analysis (LDA) model with three classes (football, judo, taekwondo), two discriminant functions were identified, explaining 62% (LD1) and 38% (LD2) of the variance between the groups, respectively. The Wilks' Lambda = 0.455 indicates statistically significant differences between the groups (F = 1.611, p = 0.0295). Model testing confirmed high accuracy in classifying respondents according to their respective sports profiles: judo (0.88 ± 0.11) and football (0.98 ± 0.03). Conclusions. Situational sports, including team sports and martial arts, require athletes to demonstrate a high level of executive functions. The development of these functions follows specific patterns influenced by the nature of sports activity. The characteristics of short-term visual memory and spatial perception in football, judo, and taekwondo athletes were identified. Based on discriminant analysis of the psychophysiological testing results, a model with a predictive accuracy of 72.5% was developed, allowing for the classification of respondents into their respective sport groups (football, judo, taekwondo). Analysis of variance revealed that statistically significant differences between the groups are associated with indicators related to spatial perception. The findings confirm that spatial perception exhibits distinct features depending on the type of sport.