The quiet eye and tasks demands: Do tougher shots need a quieter eye?

The Quiet Eye (QE; Vickers 1996) has been shown to underpin successful performance, differentiating both expertise (inter-individual) and proficiency (intra-individual), with experts and successful attempts characterised by longer QE durations. The QE is proposed to reflect the time needed to organise and fine tune the parameters of movement (e.g. force and direction). In order to examine this prediction and build upon previous research we experimentally manipulated the difficulty of a golf putting task; we hypothesised that if the QE is related to motor programming then a more difficult task should be associated with longer QE durations. 33 golfers (M age= 21.16, SD= 3.98) with an average handicap of 6.5 (SD= 6.02) performed putts in 4 conditions of increasing difficulty. We manipulated the length of the golf putt (short-4ft, long-8ft) and the contact point of the putter head (large-1.7cm, small-0.5cm,) giving increasingly difficult putting conditions of short-large [1], short-small [2], long-large [3] and long-small [4]. We measured performance (radial error from hole in cm) and QE (in ms) for 10 putts in each condition. A repeated measures ANOVA was performed on the performance and QE data. The performance data suggest that we were successful in increasing the difficulty of the task (F (3,93) = 26.46. p = .000), with the best performance in condition [1] (8.57cm), followed by [2] (9.10cm) followed by [3] (16.11cm) and finally the worst performance was in condition [4] (23.40cm). The QE data suggest that, in keeping with our hypothesis, the QE was lengthened as task difficulty increased (F (3,87) = 11.91, p = .043). The QE was shortest in condition [1] (1787.85ms) and increased to condition [2] (1939.78ms) and condition [3] (2076.51ms), with the longest QE in condition [4] (2164.08ms). More detailed analysis of the QE reveal that it was the proportion of the QE that occurred before movement initiation (pre-QE) which increased with shot difficulty, rather than the proportion that occurred during the swing (Online-QE; see Vine et al., 2013). Results support the notion that more complex tasks are associated with a longer QE duration, specifically participants appear to spend longer fixating the target prior to movement. This likely reflects the time needed to process visual information gathered in a pre-performance routine, to inhibit external distraction, and to pre-programme the increasingly difficult parameters of the movement. Vickers, J.N. (1996). Visual control when aiming at a far target. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 22, 342-354. Vine, S.J. et al. (2013). Quiet eye and choking: Online control breaks down at the point of performance failure. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 45, 1988-1994.

Pile-dwellings of the Neolithic and the Bronze Age in Switzerland. Long-term research and future tasks

Swiss lake-side settlements dating between 4300 and 800 BC were first recognized in the early 19th century and between 1854 and 1880 early research boomed due to the first scientific studies and the artificial lowering of lakes in Western Switzerland. In the 20th century underwater and wetland archaeology experienced an enormous surge not only because of large rescue excavations, due to extensive motorway construction projects but also due to the evolution of modern IT technology in the 1970s. For the first time huge quantities of ancient wooden structures could be dated by dendrochronology. This produced a quantum leap in the 150 years of pile-dwelling research. In 2011, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee recognized the outstanding universal value of these sites. This article presents an overview about Swiss pile-dwellings of the Neolithic and the Bronze Age and the results of two recent diploma works (case study Sutz-Lattrigen Haupstation innen and case study Seedorf Lobsigensee) as examples of research and cooperation between universities and government agencies for cultural heritage management.

Prediction and prevention of psychosis: current progress and future tasks

Prevention of psychoses has been intensively investigated within the past two decades, and particularly, prediction has been much advanced. Depending on the applied risk indicators, current criteria are associated with average, yet significantly heterogeneous transition rates of ≥30 % within 3 years, further increasing with longer follow-up periods. Risk stratification offers a promising approach to advance current prediction as it can help to reduce heterogeneity of transition rates and to identify subgroups with specific needs and response patterns, enabling a targeted intervention. It may also be suitable to improve risk enrichment. Current results suggest the future implementation of multi-step risk algorithms combining sensitive risk detection by cognitive basic symptoms (COGDIS) and ultra-high-risk (UHR) criteria with additional individual risk estimation by a prognostic index that relies on further predictors such as additional clinical indicators, functional impairment, neurocognitive deficits, and EEG and structural MRI abnormalities, but also considers resilience factors. Simply combining COGDIS and UHR criteria in a second step of risk stratification produced already a 4-year hazard rate of 0.66. With regard to prevention, two recent meta-analyses demonstrated that preventive measures enable a reduction in 12-month transition rates by 54-56 % with most favorable numbers needed to treat of 9-10. Unfortunately, psychosocial functioning, another important target of preventive efforts, did not improve. However, these results are based on a relatively small number of trials; and more methodologically sound studies and a stronger consideration of individual profiles of clinical needs by modular intervention programs are required

Developmental tasks as a framework to study personality development in adulthood and old age

Research consistently shows that personality development is a lifelong phenomenon, with mean-level and rank-order changes occurring in all life phases. What happens during specific life phases that can explain these developmental patterns? In the present paper, we review literature linking personality development in different phases of adulthood to developmental tasks associated with these phases. Building on previous work, we describe several categories of developmental tasks that are present in all phases of adulthood. However, the specific tasks within these categories change across adulthood from establishing new social roles in early adulthood to maintaining them in middle adulthood and preventing losses in old age. This trajectory is reflected in mean-level changes in personality, which indicates development towards greater maturity (increases in social dominance, conscientiousness, and emotional stability) in early and middle adulthood, but less so at the end of life. Importantly, developmental tasks are not only associated with mean-level changes, but the way in which people deal with these tasks is also related to rank-order changes in personality. We provide an outlook for future research on how the influence of historical time on the normativeness of developmental tasks might be reflected in personality development.

Illegitimate Tasks and Sleep Quality: An Ambulatory Study

The current study investigated the short-term effect of illegitimate tasks on sleep quality, assessed by actigraphy. Seventy-six employees of different service jobs participated in a 2-week data collection. Data were analysed by way of multilevel analyses. As predicted, illegitimate tasks were positively related to sleep fragmentation and sleep-onset latency, but not to sleep efficiency and not to sleep duration. Time pressure, social stressors at work and at home, and the value of the dependent variable from the previous day were controlled. Results confirm the predictive power of illegitimate tasks for a variable that can be considered crucial in the development of long-term outcomes of daily experiences.

Illegitimate tasks, feelings of resentment, and recovery – longitudinal mediation model

Illegitimate tasks are a relatively new stressor concept, referring to tasks that an employee cannot appropriately expect to carry out. This study tested the hypothesis that illegitimate tasks predicted recovery, mediated by feelings of resentment. The hypothesis was confirmed in a longitudinal study with three waves of measurement.