Brain networks governing the golf swing in professional golfers

Abstract

Golf, as with most complex motor skills, requires multiple different brain functions, including attention, motor planning, coordination, calculation of timing, and emotional control. In this study we assessed the correlation between swing components and brain connectivity from the cerebellum to the cerebrum. Ten female golf players and 10 age-matched female controls were recruited. In order to determine swing consistency among participants, the standard deviation (SD) of the mean swing speed time and the SD of the mean swing angle were assessed over 30 swings. Functional brain connectivity was assessed by resting state functional MRI. Pro-golfers showed greater positive left cerebellum connectivity to the occipital lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe and both frontal lobes compared to controls. The SD of play scores was positively correlated with the SD of the impact angle. Constant swing speed and back swing angle in professional golfers were associated with functional connectivity (FC) between the cerebellum and parietal and frontal lobes. In addition, the constant impact angle in professional golfers was associated with improved golf scores and additional FC of the thalamus.

Ballroom Dancing Promotes Neural Activity in the Sensorimotor System: A Resting-State fMRI Study

“…The greater ALFF in the postcentral gyrus, temporal lobe, and middle occipital gyrus in ballroom dancers is consistent with other studies [ 14 , 21 ]. Postcentral gyrus, located in the primary somatosensory cortex, is part of the action observation and action imitation networks [ 22 ] and receives a large number of sensory inputs and storing perceptual experiences [ 23 , 24 ].…”

Optimizing performance through intrinsic motivation and attention for learning: The OPTIMAL theory of motor learning

“…Importantly, functional connectivity is related to motor skill learning (Albert et al, 2009;Song, Gotts, Dayan, & Cohen, 2015) and to higher levels of motor skill (Di, Zhu, Jin, Wang, Ye, Zhou et al, 2012;Ito, Matsuda, & Shimojo, 2015;Kim, Han, Kim, & Han, 2015;Milton, Solodkin, Hluštík, & Small, 2007;Li, He, Huang, Zhang, Lu, Lai et al, 2015). Functional connectivity tracks the learning of motor skills, and more distinct functional connections are associated with higher skill (Kim, Chang, Kim, Seo, Ryu, Lee et al, 2014;Milton et al, 2007).…”

“…Effective structural connections within brain regions would appear to lay the groundwork for the establishment of efficient functional connections across brain networks. Such connectivity appears to be a hallmark of experienced and expert performers (Di et al, 2012;Ito et al, 2015;Kim et al, 2015;Kim et al, 2014;Li et al, 2015;Milton et al, 2007).…”

“…Indirect measurement may be helpful (Aarts, Bijleveld, Custers, Dogge, Deelder, Schutter et al, 2012). Furthermore, innovations in the study of moments in athletic performance are promising (Kim et al, 2015;Kim et al, 2014;Milton et al, 2007).…”

Adult Gross Motor Learning and Sleep: Is There a Mutual Benefit?

“…Several human behaviors such as playing sports, playing music, and handcrafting are composed of unique combinations of gross and fine motor skills. Perfect execution of such highly coordinated tasks involves complex operations within the sensory and motor control structures [ 1 , 2 ] including learning over a long period of time [ 3 ]. Learning commonly starts with initial task acquisition and results in reaching proficiency and stabilization of the learned information for further recall.…”