Rita de Oliveira | London South Bank University (original) (raw)

Papers by Rita de Oliveira

Research in Developmental Disabilities, Jul 1, 2011

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

International Sport Coaching Journal

The ability to interact and communicate effectively in different cultural contexts has never been... more The ability to interact and communicate effectively in different cultural contexts has never been more relevant for football coaches because cultural diversity in football has increased in the past decades. Yet, there is a reduced number of institutions that are currently offering cultural training to coaches, and it is unknown whether coaches feel the need for such training. This study aimed to explore the cross-cultural training needs of 115 football coaches with national and/or international experience (M = 13.4 years; SD = 8.53). To maximise recruitment reach, an online survey with open-ended questions was used followed by a qualitative thematic analysis. There were four master themes: cross-cultural training needs in the global football market; cross-cultural awareness is important in football; football-specific cultural training; and training by migrant coaches, no matter how. Most coaches perceived a benefit from cultural training in preparation for international appointments...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Sociología del Deporte

Coaches’ migration has received limited attention. It is important to explore their migration exp... more Coaches’ migration has received limited attention. It is important to explore their migration experiences and how native coaches perceive coaches’ migration because they might have different views on this topic. The current research aims to investigate a) the perceptions of migrant coaches regarding their experiences in a host country and b) the perceptions of native coaches regarding coaches’ migration to the UK. A qualitative thematic analysis was adopted to analyse the data and MAXQDA 11 software was used to facilitate this process. In total, 15 participants residing in the UK were invited to participate through convenience sampling. An online open-ended survey was completed by ten immigrant coaches (six females, four males) with ages ranging from 19 to 44 years (mean = 30.7; SD = 9.04), and interviews were conducted with five British native coaches (four males and one female) with ages ranging from 20 to 40 years (mean = 30.5; SD = 9.15). We found that coaches’ transnational rec...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Acta Psychologica, 2022

When switching between different tasks, the initiation of task switches may depend on task charac... more When switching between different tasks, the initiation of task switches may depend on task characteristics (difficulty, salient cues, etc.) or reasons within the person performing the task (decisions, behavioral variability, etc.). The reasons for variance in switching strategies, especially in paradigms where participants are free to choose the order of tasks and the amount of switching between tasks, are not well researched. In this study, we follow up the recent discussion that variance in switching strategies might be partly explained by the characteristics of the person fulfilling the task. We examined whether risk tendency and impulsiveness differentiate individuals in their response (i.e., switch rates and time spent on tasks) to different task characteristics on a tracking-while-typing paradigm. In detail, we manipulated two aspects of loss prospect (i.e., "payoff" as the amount of points that could be lost when tracking was unattended for too long, and "cursor speed" determining the likelihood of such a loss occurring). To account for between-subject variance and within-subject variability in the data, we employed linear mixed effect analyses following the model selection procedure (Bates, Kliegl, et al., 2015). Besides, we tested whether risk tendency can be transformed into a decision parameter which could predict switching strategies when being computationally modelled. We transferred decision parameters from the Decision Field Theory to model "switching thresholds" for each individual. Results show that neither risk tendency nor impulsiveness explain between-subject variance in the paradigm, nonetheless linear mixed-effects models confirmed that within-subject variability plays a significant role for interpreting dual-task data. Our computational model yielded a good model fit, suggesting that the use of a decision threshold parameter for switching may serve as an alternative means to classify different strategies in task switching.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 2021

The aim of this study was to examine the impact of predictability on dual-task performance by sys... more The aim of this study was to examine the impact of predictability on dual-task performance by systematically manipulating predictability in either one of two tasks, as well as between tasks. According to capacity-sharing accounts of multitasking, assuming a general pool of resources two tasks can draw upon, predictability should reduce the need for resources and allow more resources to be used by the other task. However, it is currently not well understood what drives resource-allocation policy in dual tasks and which resource allocation policies participants pursue. We used a continuous tracking task together with an audiomotor task and manipulated advance visual information about the tracking path in the first experiment and a sound sequence in the second experiments (2a/b). Results show that performance predominantly improved in the predictable task but not in the unpredictable task, suggesting that participants did not invest more resources into the unpredictable task. One possi...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Memory & Cognition, 2020

This study examined the effect of instructions and feedback on the integration of two tasks. Task... more This study examined the effect of instructions and feedback on the integration of two tasks. Task-integration of covarying tasks are thought to help dual-task performance. With complete task integration of covarying dual tasks, a dual task becomes more like a single task and dual-task costs should be reduced as it is no longer conceptualized as a dual task. In the current study we tried to manipulate the extent to which tasks are integrated. We covaried a tracking task with an auditory go/no-go task and tried to manipulate the extent of task-integration by using two different sets of instructions and feedback. A group receiving task-integration promoting instructions and feedback (N = 18) and a group receiving task-separation instructions and feedback (N = 20) trained on a continuous tracking task. The tracking task covaried with the auditory go/no-go reaction time task because high-pitch sounds always occurred 250 ms before turns, which has been demonstrated to foster task integrat...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of Cognition, 2021

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of Cognition, 2020

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 2019

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Human Movement Science

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research

Cultural intelligence is the capability of a person to adapt effectively to different cultures. T... more Cultural intelligence is the capability of a person to adapt effectively to different cultures. This capability has been investigated in areas such as management, military, and education. However, there are no studies in sport referring to this capability. It is important to study cultural intelligence in sport because of the increased globalisation resulting from coaches’ and athletes’ migration across countries and clubs. This study aimed to develop the Cultural Intelligence in Sport (CQsport) and examine its factorial structure and psychometric properties; and examine coaches’ cultural intelligence and their perceived cross-cultural training needs. Participants were 209 football coaches either with or without international experience. Participants completed an online survey consisting of CQsport and a cross-cultural training needs questionnaire. We used a multigroup analysis, within the structural equation model (SEM) approach, to test group differences in the CQsport and perform...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Sports Coaching Review

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Studies of sign languages have been used to test traditional cognitive models of working memory (... more Studies of sign languages have been used to test traditional cognitive models of working memory (WM) that distinguish between verbal and visuospatial WM (e.g. Baddeley, 2003), without considering that sign languages operate in the visuospatial domain. Previous studies have shown that WM mental representations and processes are largely similar for signed and spoken languages (e.g. Ronnberg et al., 2004). However, it is not clear to what extent visual WM processes aid and support sign language WM.Here we characterise the neural substrates supporting sign language and visual WM, and the mechanisms that subserve differential processing for signers and for deaf individuals. We conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment with three groups of participants: deaf native signers, hearing native signers and hearing non-signers. Participants performed a 2-back WM task and a control task on two sets of stimuli: signs from British Sign Language or non-sense objects. Stimul...

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Does the superior temporal cortex have a role in cognitive control as a consequence of cross-moda... more Does the superior temporal cortex have a role in cognitive control as a consequence of cross-modal reorganization?

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Research in Developmental Disabilities, Jul 1, 2011

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

International Sport Coaching Journal

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Sociología del Deporte

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Acta Psychologica, 2022

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 2021

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Memory & Cognition, 2020

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of Cognition, 2021

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of Cognition, 2020

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 2019

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Human Movement Science

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Sports Coaching Review

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

In the sports literature there is disagreement: is visual information primarily used for planning... more In the sports literature there is disagreement: is visual information primarily used for planning goal-directed movements or for their moment-to-moment guidance during execution? There are three main arguments for the former. First, visuomotor delays may render sensorymotor updates untimely for some movements. Second, longer target fixations are associated with expertise and accuracy. Third, with practice performers become less dependent on concurrent information. I will argue that these findings are critically dependent on the participant and task under study, and that critical variables are visual timing and the ability to use information. Expert sportspeople and people with coordination difficulties are at the extremes of a normal distribution curve for visuomotor performance. I will present behavioural results to illustrate their efficient use of concurrent visual information. I will also show that more visual information is not always an advantage (even when the information is relevant to the task) with consequences for the understanding of brain function.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

What are the cognitive characteristics of triathletes and what are their thoughts during the vari... more What are the cognitive characteristics of triathletes and what are their thoughts during the various segments of the race. Research shows that experts have more proactive and active thoughts related with performance around transition segments. Different thoughts occur in overtaking situations. In this talk I will show the data and discuss the implications for training. The result will be a handful of strategies that can be included in the training sessions to address these psychological aspects of performance.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

TBA

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

I will present my work about the use of visual information in DCD including suggestions in terms ... more I will present my work about the use of visual information in DCD including suggestions in terms of neurological deficits and how to investigate those.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

The lecture will cover: common problems in writing and suggested solutions; the writing process ... more The lecture will cover:
common problems in writing and suggested solutions;
the writing process
function of language (signalling, linking, clarifying red thread, etc)
writing model
instructions for authors
structure of manuscript
structure of paragraphs and sentences

The seminar will consist of analysing and discussing these topics using published articles as a starting point.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

In this study we use a driving simulator and a virtual city to examine steering, speed adjustment... more In this study we use a driving simulator and a virtual city to examine steering, speed adjustment and reaction to hazards on the road. Participants were adolescents and young adults who had been diagnosed with developmental coordination disorder as children (n = 13) and for whom symptoms had either been maintained (DCD, n = 8) or had largely dissipated (atypically developing: AD, n = 5). Compared to their matched controls, the DCD group showed more steering adjustments and larger heading variance on bends and a tendency to drive slower on the straight roads. They also took 150 % longer than their typically developing matched control participants to react to pedestrians who walked towards their path. We found no such differences between the AD group and their matched controls. We discuss the results in terms of visual information processing and give suggestions for further applied and fundamental research on this topic.

Workshop questions:

Could driving simulators be used as an introduction to driving in people with DCD?
Under what conditions could navigation aids be used to help, rather than hinder, driving in people with DCD?
What levels of information processing are more likely to be the main problem with learning to drive in people with DCD?

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

The general aim of the research presented in this thesis was to elucidate the visual basis of bas... more The general aim of the research presented in this
thesis was to elucidate the visual basis of basketball
shooting. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the
pertinent literature. Previous studies on the topic
focused on temporal aspects of vision and identified
the rapidity of orienting and stabilising head and eyes
on the target (Ripoll et al., 1986) and long target
fixations (Ripoll et al.; Vickers, 1996) as necessary
ingredients for successful performance and
distinguishing marks of expertise. In apparent contrast
to the long target fixations, a more recent study
highlighted the benefits of looking at the target late
(Oudejans et al., 2002). To help resolve this issue we
examined the preferred timing of optical information
pick-up in Chapter 2, the effects of online and offline
visual control in Chapter 3, and the gaze behaviour
during the preparation and execution of the shooting
movements in Chapter 4. In addition to the temporal
aspects of vision, we investigated the information
sources that are used to guide basketball shooting in
three experiments, which are reported in Chapter 5.
The contents of these chapters may be summarised in
greater detail as follows.
In Chapter 2 we investigated the preferred timing of
optical information pick-up and how this depended on
the shooting style used. Our hypothesis was that
expert basketball players prefer to look at the target
as late as permitted by their shooting style. The
employed shooting style determines whether or not
a player can see the basket following the moment
when ball and hands pass the line of sight (mLoS).
Players with a low shooting style can only see the
basket before mLoS, whereas players with a high
shooting style can see the basket after mLoS until ball
release. To investigate when players with either type
of shooting style prefer to view the basket, we used
an intermittent viewing technique and a 3D
movement registration system. We used liquid crystal
glasses that intermittently turned transparent and
opaque (for 350 and 250 ms, respectively). The 3D
movement registration system Optotrak was used to
determine mLoS. Twelve expert basketball players, five
with a low style and seven with a high style,
participated in the experiment. Their percentage of
hits under intermittent viewing was not significantly
different from that under full vision, and was
independent of shooting style. In a subsequent
analysis, we mapped mLoS onto the events defined on
the glasses, and used circular statistics to determine
whether shooting-style dependent timing patterns
were present. The results showed that in the low-style
group mLoS occurred when the glasses became
opaque, implying that the players could see the basket
just before mLoS. In the high-style group, mLoS
occurred near the moment when the glasses became
transparent, implying that the players could see the
basket just after mLoS until ball release. In other
words, both groups viewed the basket as late as their
shooting kinematics allowed. In addition to confirming our hypothesis, these results support the view that basketball shooting is controlled
online by vision.
This view was examined further in Chapter 3, which reports an experiment that we
conducted to determine whether basketball shooting relies primarily on online or
offline visual control. Our hypothesis was that basketball players use online visual
information to execute the shooting movements, in order to insure that performance
is accurate. To test this hypothesis, we employed a visual delay paradigm. We used
liquid crystal glasses that either remained transparent throughout movement
execution, or became opaque zero, one, or two seconds before movement initiation.
A movement registration system (Optotrak) was used to register the movements of
the shooting arm (ring and little fingers, metacarpal area, wrist, elbow, shoulder) in 3D.
Ball trajectories were recorded to estimate the landing position of the ball on the
plane of the rim. Seventeen expert basketball players, eight with a low style and nine
with a high style, participated in the experiment. Both the percentage of hits and the
landing positions revealed marked decrements in performance with increasing delays.
Furthermore, the analysis of covariance coefficients on the kinematic data revealed
that the severity of visual conditions was associated with decreased coupling
strength and increased variability between the arm joints. Even though most shots
still landed in the vicinity of the basket in the absence of vision, accuracy was
significantly better under normal viewing. Although this study does not rule out the
use of offline visual information, it underscores the online use of visual information in
basketball shooting.
In Chapter 4 we investigated whether the gaze behaviour of expert basketball players
was dependent on their shooting style and the type of basketball shot performed.
Based on previous findings, we expected that low-style players would look long at the
basket in the free throw but less long in the jump shot, and that high-style players
would look at the basket after mLoS until ball release both in the free throw and the
jump shot. We invited six expert basketball players, three with a low style and three
with a high style, to take ten jump shots and ten free throws while wearing an eye
tracking system to register their looking behaviour. Looking behaviour was coded for each frame, such that looking at the rim was 1, the
basket’s net or small square on the backboard was .8,
the remaining backboard was .6, other locations were
.4 and no gaze behaviour was 0. Next, we analysed the
gaze behaviour directed at the basket or backboard
before and after mLoS. The results were in accordance
with our expectations. The low-style shooters looked
at the target only before mLoS and for about 1 s in the
free throw but half that duration in the jump shot,
without any repercussions for shooting accuracy. The
high-style shooters, in contrast, looked consistently at
the target after mLoS both in the free throw and in the
jump shot for about 400 ms.
In Chapter 5 we investigated the optical basis of
basketball shooting in a series of three experiments.
From a theoretical analysis it appeared that the
absolute distance between player and basket (d) and
the angle of elevation subtended by the line of gaze to
the basket (α) could be used conjointly to determine
the exact location of the basket. Alternatively, the
location of the basket could be determined by using
either d or α in combination with the height of the
basket, which was always set at the same official
height. In the first experiment it appeared that expert
basketball shooters preserved good shooting accuracy
when d and α were the only information sources
available during movement execution. In the second
experiment, accuracy was maintained upon removal of
information sources related to d, indicating that those
information sources were less relevant for successful
shooting. Finally, we tested the use of α by
manipulating the height of the basket unbeknownst
to participants. Consistent with the use of angle of
elevation, participants misperceived heightened
baskets as being closer and lowered baskets as being
further away. We therefore concluded that angle of
elevation information, calibrated to the official
basket’s height, was used for successful shooting.
In sum, the experiments presented in the present
thesis provided clear insights into the visual basis of
basketball shooting. They highlight the importance of
the online use of visual information during movement
execution and of using the latest and most updated
visual information available. A likely variable that may
be picked up and used to guide the shooting
movements is the angle of elevation, which is
informative about the distance from the player to the
target provided that both perception and shooting
action are calibrated to the official height of the
basket. These insights have broad theoretical
implications, as well as several possible applications,
that are discussed in the sixth and final chapter of this
thesis.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact