The Effect of Arousal (by Audience and Music as Motivational Factors) on Learning and Performance of Continuous Skill (Basketball Dribbling)

The aim of this study was to survey the effect of arousal by the presence of audience and music and their comparison on learning and performance of basketball dribbling. Subjects were 36 healthy and non-athlete girls (mean and SD of age 21.8±2.23 years, height 163.4±6.19cm and weight 57.5±10.13kg) were divided into three groups of audience (n=12), music (n = 12) and control (n = 12) randomly. Training protocol in the acquisition stage included basketball dribbling of Harrison test for 6 weeks, 3 sessions per week, and 30 seconds per session with the presence of motivational factors in separate groups. Score of dribbling test was record per session, then posttest was carried out and finally after two weeks of detraining, retention test was performed in the same condition and transfer test like the real condition of competitions (with the presence of music and audience) was performed 24 hours later. Rest heart rate index was used to maintain the subjects in the same level of arousal. To analyze the data, one-way ANOVA test, ANOVA with repeated measures and Bonferroni post hoc test was used. Results showed that all groups improved their skill learning in the acquisition stage. Also, there was a significant difference in basketball dribbling scores among the groups in the acquisition stage (p=0.0001) and this difference was higher in the control group (i.e. audience and music groups had weaker performance in the posttest of acquisition stage). But in retention and transfer tests, music and audience groups were at an advantage; audience group achieved the highest scores in retention test and music and audience groups gained higher significant scores than control group in transfer test (p=0.0001).