Precise verbal feedback may expedite the attainment of standing long jump accuracy in women

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the precision of verbal feedback affected the accuracy of a standing long jump performance. Sixty-eight female participants (M age=21.44±1.01) were randomly assigned to two experimental groups. In total, each subject performed nine jumps at three distances, i.e. 50 cm (3 trials), 75 cm (3 trials) and 100 cm (3 trials). Group 2 performed jumps in a reverse order. During the task execution, the study participants received verbal feedback at different levels of precision (no feedback; information that the jump was either: too far, close, or correct; information about the distance in centimetres). The results of statistical analysis indicated that the speed of changes in jump accuracy depended on the precision of verbal feedback. The difference between an actual jump result and a target result increased proportionally with jump length. With a large number of trials, verbal feedback accuracy does not affect significantly the precision of women’s long jump performance. However, when the high accuracy of task performance needs to be obtained quickly, feedback ought to define the exact difference between the target and the actual jump results. The current findings also indicate that providing no feedback does not contribute to improving motor task performance accuracy.