It has always been said that soccer goalkeepers are different, of a different nature, peculiar types, endowed with reflexes that are often out of the ordinary. However, science could corroborate this popular saying. In this sport, goalkeepers need to make a large number of decisions in a short time based on limited or incomplete sensory information to prevent the opposing team from scoring a goal. Now, a new study has found scientific evidence indicating that soccer goalkeepers perceive the world around them in a very different way from other players and quickly process information from multiple sensory signals.
The study has been published in Current Biology and was conducted by researchers at Dublin City University (DCU), who hypothesized that professional goalkeepers would show enhanced multisensory temporal processing relative to their field counterparts.
To check if they were right, they recruited 60 volunteers, including professional goalkeepers, professional soccer players and a group of individuals of similar age who did not play soccer, and looked for differences between the three groups in what are known as union windows. temporal, which is the time window within which signals from the different senses are likely to merge or integrate.
Goalkeepers’ multisensory temporal processing might also have improved due to repeated exposure to audiovisual stimuli.
In each trial they showed participants one or two images (visual stimuli) on a screen. Those images could be presented along with one, two, or no beeps (auditory stimuli). These auditory stimuli were used to interfere with the viewing of the images and were separated by different amounts of time.
Goalkeepers process different signals faster
The researchers found that goalkeepers had a narrower temporal bonding window compared to other players and participants who did not play soccer. Dr. David McGovern, a psychologist at DCU, who led the study, explained that goalkeepers make a faster estimate of the different signals they are receiving, than on the field of play would be observing the movement of the ball in the air. and the sound when it is hit, for example.
Goalkeepers also showed a greater tendency to separate these sensory signals, which may be due to the need to make quick decisions based on visual and auditory information arriving at different times. What they have not been able to clarify is whether these differences are linked to the rigorous training sessions that professional goalkeepers undergo, or to a natural ability that predisposes some young players to be goalkeepers.
In fact, the researchers conclude in their article that “an important unresolved question is whether this multisensory advantage arises from a pre-existing skill set that initially led them to become goalkeepers, or whether it is the result of a perceptual learning effect through “which repeated exposure to audiovisual stimuli has improved their multisensory temporal processing over time.”
Although only male players were evaluated in this research, the team has requested funding to study female players and another of its objectives is to investigate whether players who occupy other highly specialized positions, such as forwards or midfielders, also show perceptual differences. .
