Auditory Information Reduces Response Time for Ball Rotation Perception, Increasing Counterattack Performance in Table Tennis.

Purpose: Identifying the magnitude of ball rotation is critical to reduce response time, aiming to improve table tennis performance. This study analyzed the influence of auditory and visual information on the perception accuracy and counterattack performance of table tennis players. Methods: Twenty-two high-level table tennis players (22.5 ± 6.1 years, 71.2 ± 9.8 kg, 173.5 ± 7.7 cm) performed two tasks. In the first task, the athletes analyzed audio and video files of the forehand movement on a computer screen with auditory, visual, and combined information and, as soon as possible, chose the ball spin type on a keyboard: fast (spinning ball forward at 140 rotations per second (rotations/s); medium (105 rotations/s); slow (84 rotations/s); or flat hit (70 rotations/s). In the second task, the athletes performed 80 counterattacks (forehand movement) at the table on a target (68x38 cm) with and without auditory information. Results: Friedman's ANOVA revealed a significant effect of condition for perception accuracy (p < .001). Post hoc tests showed higher perception accuracy in the combined and visual conditions. ANOVA also revealed a significant effect of condition for response time to perceive ball rotation (p < .001). The response time was shorter in the combined condition than the other conditions for all spin types. Kendall's analyses showed no significant correlations between perception accuracy and response time in any ball spin type. Regarding the counterattack performance, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test indicated higher performance when auditory information was available (p = .022). Conclusions: As auditory information influences the response time and counterattack performance, it seems crucial for trainers and athletes to explore and include auditory perception training methods.

Preferred Music Genre Benefits During Strength Tests: Increased Maximal Strength and Strength-Endurance and Reduced Perceived Exertion.

The ability to increase muscle strength seems to be influenced by extrinsic factors such as the characteristics of an exercise environment. Given that many people train while listening to music, the music environment is an important research topic. However, no studies have investigated whether a preferred music genre differentially affects strength production when compared to a non-preferred music genre. This study evaluated the influence of listening to varied conditions of musical genre preference on maximal strength and strength-endurance testing, and on ratings of perceived exertion (RPE). We submitted 20 young men to three different listening conditions during strength testing: (a) preferred music genre (PMG), (b) non-preferred music genre (NPMG), and (c) no music (NM), with the order of these conditions randomized. We measured maximal strength with a handgrip dynamometer, strength-endurance through the participant's maximal repetition execution in the lat-pulldown exercise, and RPE by participant-completed Borg's scales at the end of the strength tests. Using three-way analyses of variances (ANOVAs) and a significance level of p < 0.05, we found that participants produced higher maximal strength, performed more repetitions of the lat-pulldown exercise, and reported decreased RPE in the PMG condition, compared to the NPMG (maximal strength p < 0.01, strength-endurance p < 0.01, RPE p = 0.016) and NM (maximal strength p < 0.01, strength-endurance p < 0.01, RPE p = 0.023) conditions. Individually determined PMG appears to improve maximal strength and strength-endurance performance during exercise, and to decrease RPE in the PMG condition.