Color perception is impaired in baseball batters while performing an interceptive action

Abstract

In order to test the theoretical idea that experts rely more on the dorsal stream than the ventral stream during interceptive action for the interception of a moving target, the present study investigates the perception of color (dominant in ventral processing) during interceptive action in fast-ball sports. Twelve college baseball players and 12 non-baseball players performed a coincident-timing task with target color changes (from white to red, blue, or white) at various time points (at 100, 200, or 300 ms before target arrival). In this task, participants swung a bat and/or pressed a button in response to the target's arrival at a prespecified location. Participants were then asked to state the final color of the target. Baseball players, but not non-baseball players, were significantly less proficient at identifying color changes during the bat-swing condition relative to the button-press condition, irrespective of the time points of color change. These results are consistent with the idea that baseball players rely more on the dorsal stream during bat swinging for the interception of a moving target than do novices.

Optimal integration of kinematic and ball-flight information when perceiving the speed of a moving ball

“…After attempting to hit the two pitches, participants were asked to verbally report which ball speed they perceived to be faster (i.e., that in the “first” or “second” pitch). Although there has been some criticism of the use of unnatural response modes, including verbal responses, for testing perceptual expertise in interceptive sport ( 43 – 45 ), we used the verbal response because Takamido et al had already shown that the pitching movement speed influences performance in the ball-speed evaluation task irrespective of whether the participant's response is recorded verbally ( 24 ) or through movement ( 46 ). The reference stimulus always showed the participant-specific natural pitching-movement-speed.…”

Effects of in-situ stroboscopic training on visual, visuomotor and reactive agility in youth volleyball players

“…It is also possible that the sensory processing measurement used in this study (reaction time to a yellow light appearing on a computer screen, flashing light in a sensory sensitivity test) primarily activated processing in the ventral visual stream, which is responsible for processing visual information such as object recognition and color perception ( Ungerleider & Mishkin, 1982 ), while the environment of the volleyball players mainly requires the use of the dorsal visual stream, which processes more coarse visual information such as motion, depth and spatial location. The results indicate that athletes required to quickly respond to moving stimuli rely more on their dorsal stream ( Sasada et al, 2015 ). However, research suggests that there is an interaction between the dorsal and ventral pathways in action contexts ( van Polanen & Davare, 2015 ), so stroboscopic excitation of the dorsal pathway may influence the ventral pathway.…”

Review: Sport Performance and the Two-visual-system Hypothesis of Vision: Two Pathways but Still Many Questions

“…The target changed color during its trajectory, and participants were asked to identify the final color. Sasada et al 22 found that the color perception of the baseball players was worse in the coupled response than in the uncoupled one, a difference not observed in the non-baseball players. These results were interpreted to suggest that the experts relied more on the dorsal stream during actual interceptive actions than novices did.…”

“…In an elegant test of the two-visual-system hypothesis, Sasada and colleagues 22 tested whether the dorsal stream is more likely to be engaged in skilled baseball batters when hitting a ball rather than when perceiving its position. Because color perception is processed largely in the ventral but not dorsal stream, Sasada et al 22 hypothesized that color perception should be impaired when the dorsal stream is engaged (i.e., when an action is produced).…”

“…In an elegant test of the two-visual-system hypothesis, Sasada and colleagues 22 tested whether the dorsal stream is more likely to be engaged in skilled baseball batters when hitting a ball rather than when perceiving its position. Because color perception is processed largely in the ventral but not dorsal stream, Sasada et al 22 hypothesized that color perception should be impaired when the dorsal stream is engaged (i.e., when an action is produced). Experienced and inexperienced baseball players were asked to perform a coincidence-timing task either when swinging a bat (coupled response) or when pressing a button (uncoupled response) when a virtual ball reached them.…”