An exploratory study on the effect of a four-week stroboscopic vision training program on soccer dribbling performance

BACKGROUND: Perceptual-cognitive skill is a crucial component of expert performance in sport as expert athletes rely on the integration and processing of sensory information to execute complex actions. One of the topics of interest to skill acquisition researchers is therefore how the perceptual-cognitive system can be trained, and how that affects sport skill performance. One of the methods suggested to be able to aid in the training of perceptual-cognitive skill is restricted visual feedback training.  Recently, stroboscopic vision glasses have been proposed as a tool that can restrict visual feedback during sport training and may therefore provide a useful tool for training sport-specific skills.However, despite its use in practice, evidence for the beneficial effect of stroboscopic vision on sport-specific performance across youth athletes with a range of performance levels is currently lacking. AIM: Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the effect of a four-week soccer training program with (experimental group) or without (control group) stroboscopic vision on the dribbling performance of relatively fast and slow dribblers. METHOD: To measure dribbling performance, this study used the Ugent Soccer dribbling task. RESULTS: A Repeated Measures MANOVA revealed that four weeks of stroboscopic vision training did not improve soccer dribbling skill measured through the time taken to complete the dribbling task as well as the number of touches of the ball while dribbling. CONCLUSION: While stroboscopic vision can likely lead to short term changes in perceptual-cognitive skill, it is likely not related to persistent changes in soccer dribbling performance in youth soccer players.