Underlying mechanisms and constraints of head fakes in sports

Attending the gaze direction of an interacting partner might be essential in most sport settings. Team members of a basketball team use their gazes to signal their teammates where they intend to run or to pass. The members of the contrary team might also try to use the opponents gaze directions for their advantage, namely to anticipate the opponents planned actions in order to eventually prevent them (e.g. to intercept a pass). However, attending the direction of the opponents gaze might be a disadvantage if the gaze is used to intentionally tangle the opponent. This is evident in so called head fakes: while the gaze is oriented in one direction, a relevant pass is played into another direction.

Our prior studies conducted in a classical laboratory setting did show that responses to stimuli depicting a feinting basketball player were slower and more error prone compared to stimuli depicting a non-feinting basketball player (so called feint-effect). Processing of the pass obviously results in a time-consuming and error-inducing conflict if the gaze direction is contrary to the pass direction compared to if the gaze direction is in line with the pass direction. The core question of our planned project refers to the underlying mechanism and the regulation of this conflict in dependence of practice, training, and expertise. Besides, we aim to evaluate the role of different instructions and the frequency a feint is applied. Moreover, our project for the first time addresses the question whether or not producing a feint also causes costs (production costs).

The project described here is characterized by experiments conducted with a high ecological validity. That means, on the one hand, that the stimulus material we use are video-scenes and not static pictures. On the other hand, participants’ responses to this stimulus material are realistic-like movements, that is, blocking movements in the direction of the expected pass. By doing so, we will get considerable insights into the relevant factors of skilled performance when perceiving and producing feints in basketball. The constraints of the feint-effect investigated here (i.e. frequency, instruction, learning) might directly have an impact on how to optimally use feint actions in sports.