The purpose of present study was investigation of the effect of attention direction variation by instructional self-talk on performance and learning of Basketball free throw. Therefore, 33 novice female students (mean of the age=22 yr.) who had intermediate trait anxiety were selected randomly. The participants were assigned to 3 matched groups according to pretest. The self-talk with internal and external focus groups repeated the words “wrist” and “center of ring”, respectively, before each free throw during 6 sessions (2 blocks of 10 trials in each session). Control group performed the free throws without self-talk. Retention test was performed 48 hours after the acquisition phase and transfer test was done after that with spectators. In each test, throw accuracy was measured by a 5-point scale. Results of mix 2-factor and one-way ANOVA did not indicate significant differences between acquisition, retention, and transfer groups (p>.05), but the within subjects effect of external focus of attention on transfer was significant (p<.05). Therefore, it seems use of self-talk and its attentional focus variation is not necessary for novice Basketball players.

Keywords: Basketball free throw, Focus of attention, learning, Self-talk

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