The Role of Reinvestment Capacity in Motor Skill Learning Using Explicit and Analogy Instructions

Finding effective instructional methods to optimize sports performance has always been a focus of researchers. Two main instruction methods analogy and explicit have been studied. some studies suggest that analogy-based instruction is more beneficial for beginners. The main objective of this study was to compare the effects of explicit and analogy-based instruction on learning the golf putting skill in children and to examine the moderating role of the tendency for conscious reprocessing. Participants included 90 female students aged 13–15, who were divided into high and low conscious reprocessing groups based on questionnaire scores. They were then randomly assigned to six groups (analogy, explicit ,control with high/low reprocessing). The study phases consisted of a pretest, practice (6 blocks of 10 trials), posttest, and retention test. Performance accuracy was measured based on the distance of the ball from the target center.
The results indicated a significant improvement in performance in both the explicit and analogy groups. The analogy group performed better than both the explicit and control groups (p = 0.04). Additionally, the explicit group showed significantly better performance than the control group (p = 0.002). However, there was no significant difference between high and low conscious reprocessing groups (p = 0.623). The findings suggest that analogy-based instruction is more effective for motor skill learning in children, and individual differences in the tendency for conscious reprocessing do not influence this effect. This study recommends that future research explore the combination of instructional methods and the role of individual cognitive factors.