The influence of expertise on brain activation of the action observation network during anticipation of tennis and volleyball serves

Abstract

In many daily activities, and especially in sport, it is necessary to predict the effects of others' actions in order to initiate appropriate responses. Recently, researchers have suggested that the action–observation network (AON) including the cerebellum plays an essential role during such anticipation, particularly in sport expert performers. In the present study, we examined the influence of task-specific expertise on the AON by investigating differences between two expert groups trained in different sports while anticipating action effects. Altogether, 15 tennis and 16 volleyball experts anticipated the direction of observed tennis and volleyball serves while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The expert group in each sport acted as novice controls in the other sport with which they had only little experience. When contrasting anticipation in both expertise conditions with the corresponding untrained sport, a stronger activation of AON areas (SPL, SMA), and particularly of cerebellar structures, was observed. Furthermore, the neural activation within the cerebellum and the SPL was linearly correlated with participant's anticipation performance, irrespective of the specific expertise. For the SPL, this relationship also holds when an expert performs a domain-specific anticipation task. Notably, the stronger activation of the cerebellum as well as of the SMA and the SPL in the expertise conditions suggests that experts rely on their more fine-tuned perceptual-motor representations that have improved during years of training when anticipating the effects of others' actions in their preferred sport. The association of activation within the SPL and the cerebellum with the task achievement suggests that these areas are the predominant brain sites involved in fast motor predictions. The SPL reflects the processing of domain-specific contextual information and the cerebellum the usage of a predictive internal model to solve the anticipation task.

Expertise-related functional brain network efficiency in healthy older adults

“…Cross-sectional studies comparing groups with different expertise levels have revealed that expertise is associated with beneficial functional brain network characteristics [25, 34, 35, 37]. In line with these findings, two of the three groups examined in our study had developed a particular expertise due to their specific training histories.…”

“…Experience-dependent alterations have been shown in resting state [63] as well as in task-related functional brain networks [34, 35, 37]. With regard to resting state, professional musicians showed increased functional connectivity in motor, visual, auditory, and somatosensory cortices [63].…”

The dynamics of the interrelation of perception and action across the life span

“…For example, brain areas involved in performing an action were engaged more strongly during the perception of actions for which the observers have a specific motor expertise than for actions for which the participants only possess visual experience (e.g. dancers: Calvo-Merino, Grèzes, Glaser, Passingham, & Haggard, 2006; volleyball and tennis players: Balser et al, 2014;pianists: Haslinger et al, 2005;Haueisen & Knösche, 2001; biologically possible vs. impossible actions: Stevens, Fonlupt, Shiffrar, & Decety, 2000).…”

Is visual–perceptual or motor expertise critical for expert anticipation in sport?

“…These findings suggest that the processes related to sensory perception (e.g., visual system) and action (motor system) are tightly integrated during visual–perceptual–motor behaviour. In relation to anticipation in sport, several studies using neurophysiological measures such as fMRI with video‐based temporal occlusion have confirmed greater coactivation of sensory and motor regions of the brain in experts compared with less skilled players (e.g., Balser et al, ; Calvo‐Merino, Glaser, Grèzes, Passingham, & Haggard, ; Wright, Bishop, Jackson, & Abernethy, ).…”