The Relationship Between Survey View and Mental Rotation in Football Players

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate whether individual differences in viewpoint (route or survey [bird's eye] view) while playing football are associated with mental rotation ability and domain-specificity. Seventeen varsity football players were assigned to Experienced and Non-Experienced survey view groups according to a questionnaire about their experiences with survey view while playing football. Three tasks were used to compare mental rotation and viewpoint switching ability between groups: a mental rotation task to assess the ability to operate upon visuospatial mental representations; a viewpoint switching task to assess the ability to switch viewpoint internally from route to survey view in response to non-domain-specific information (e.g., toysʼ configuration); and the complex task to assess the ability to switch viewpoint from route to survey view in response to domain-specific information (e.g., playersʼ configuration) and to operate upon visuospatial mental representations. There were significant between-group differences in response time for the mental rotation and complex tasks, but not in response accuracy for any tasks. This indicates that the experienced survey view group could quickly operate upon mental representations and switch viewpoints from route to survey view, but only in a domain-specific environment. Therefore, individual differences in viewpoint when playing football are associated with mental rotation ability and viewpoint switching ability in response to domain-specific information. More specifically, mental rotation ability and viewpoint switching is contingent upon domain-specific information for the attainment of survey view during football gameplay.