Human performance requires choosing what to do and how to do it. The goal of this theoretical contribution is to advance understanding of how the motor and cognitive components of choices are intertwined. From a holistic perspective I extend simple heuristics that have been tested in cognitive tasks to motor tasks, coining the term motor heuristics. Similarly, I extend the concept of embodied cognition, that has been tested in simple sensorimotor processes changing decisions, to complex sport behavior coining the term embodied choices. Thus both motor heuristics and embodied choices explain complex behavior such as studied in sport and exercise psychology (Raab, 2017).

　The goal of the talk is to present the state of the art in complex motor skills in sports followed by an introduction of motor heuristic as rule of thumb that allows an athlete to choose between movements whereas embodied choices are rules of thumb when deciding quickly between options. Both concepts stress the importance of embodied cognition to quantify and specify how movements and cognitive processes are related. I will present a set of studies on embodied choices from simple perceptual judgments to complex climbing tasks. Climbing to yourself is a project from the Priority program of the German Research Foundation I will use to illustrate how motor skill development enhances cognitive functions. I conclude from the set of studies that we are able to quantify and specify some of the effects own movements can have on higher cognitive processes such as perceptual judgments, problem solving solution generation or planning (Raab, 2017).

　The impact of these studies relates to the acceptance that action, perception and cognition are more linked than previously thought and that producing choices should consider the actors own bodily system and the motor experiences.