JUST THROW STRIKES! THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN QUIET EYE DURATION AND BASEBALL PITCHING ACCURACY IN LOW- AND HIGH-PRESSURE TASKS

Abstract

For athletes to achieve high-performance levels in sport, precise control of attention and physical action is essential to provide the movement planning systems with adequate information to execute the appropriate movement solutions. Quiet Eye (QE) has been shown to facilitate this precise control of attention and physical action. QE is the final fixation on a specific location or object in the task environment within 3 degrees (or less) of visual angle for a minimum of 100ms before movement initiation (Vickers, 2007). This study aims to examine how pitchers control their gaze to acquire critical visual information for optimal performance in two baseball pitching tasks - a Low-Pressure (LP) task and a High-Pressure (HP) task. Researchers conducted a quantitative exploratory analysis to identify QE duration significance in the baseball pitching delivery in elite and sub-elite pitchers. The main finding of the study saw the Preparation phase identified as the critical phase of the pitching delivery (276.06 v. 158.23 v. 159.96 ms) and longer QE durations in this phase led to pitches is consistent across the literature (396.624 v. 258.83 ms). Specifically, QE occurs before movement initiation, and longer QE durations improve performance outcomes (Vickers, 2016). The Elite group held their final fixations significantly longer than the Sub-Elite group (318.37 v. 233.74 ms). The Elite group also showed longer QE durations in the High-Pressure condition (429.86 v. 202.73 ms). However, pitches executed between groups in the HP condition did not differ (10/60 v. 11/60). It is important to note that the extended fixation durations or optimal timing of the QE alone do not fully explain the differences observed in gaze strategies between the groups and conditions. This finding suggests that there may be additional factors or pathways contributing to successful motor performance. This study also revealed that the HP task led to an increase in overall heart rate (HR) (129.08 v. 136.83 bpm) but no significant change in HRV (41.25 v. 39.83 ms).