Practising archery improves attention and concentration
15 studies · 630 archers measured
The summary today
This is the question where the result follows the study design, and it is visible to the naked eye. The most striking gains come from beginners' courses measured before and after: almost twenty-five points more on the Bourdon test in forty youngsters after twelve hours of lessons, the attention score up by 41 per cent and concentration by 289 in twenty-six adult beginners, with the twenty controls not moving. The two randomised studies, by contrast, find nothing: two months of shooting in twenty-two Ukrainian beginners leave the attention tables where they were, and in twenty Malaysian adults six weeks of shooting do not shorten reaction times more than doing nothing, because both groups improve. That last study also carries the explanation of the rest: repeating the same test after six weeks improves it by itself, through familiarity. The same warning appears inside three of the favourable studies, where the control group improves by retaking the test, where the baseline score rises with age more than it rises with a month of practice, and where the effect shows only in the cognitively demanding conditions. On comparisons between those who shoot and those who do not the picture is just as split: a hundred registered Turkish children do better than peers who have just arrived, eighty Turkish children grouped by sport do not differ at all, and thirty-eight Chinese archers at provincial or national level come out slightly worse than sedentary peers on interference tests, although their disadvantage lies in how many items they complete rather than in errors. Nobody, in any of this, has checked whether the attention measured by a test changes anything on the target.
Also phrased as: "archery teaches you to concentrate"; "archery improves children's attention"; "archery and concentration at school"; "archery for inattentive youngsters"; "practising archery trains concentration"
In practice
Archery is offered in schools and to youngsters as the sport that teaches you to stay still and concentrate, and it is taken for granted that the attention trained on the range carries over outside it.
Evidence
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2017
Against Archers Published later
Sixty-five Russian archers aged thirteen to nineteen, with one to eight years of experience, measured with computerised attention tests: years of practice do not separate the groups on any of the tests. If practice trained attention, within a group of archers seniority ought to matter.
Psychological features of attention in archery · Ekaterina Yu. Korobeinikova, Sergey V. Leonov, Irina S. Polikanova
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2017
Context Archers Published later
Eighteen students at a Turkish secondary school, interviewed after twelve weeks of one archery lesson a week, say they feel more attentive and focused. It is a theme that emerged in interviews, with no measurement of attention at all, in a journal with questionable editorial standards.
Investigation of Participation Motivations in Exercises of Students Participating in Archery in Extra Curricular Activities Questionable venue · Nevin Gündüz, Muzaffer Toprak Keskin, Fuat Erduğan
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2018
Against Archers Published later
Twenty-two Ukrainian beginner archers aged eighteen to twenty, eleven per group, two months of shooting training with or without balance exercises: the Schulte and Gorbov tables stay unchanged in both groups, with every p above 0.05, for instance attention switching from 80.4 to 81.8. A regional journal and statistics done with the t test alone.
Influence of application of special means of development of equilibrium and precision-target movements on the level and structure of psychophysiological indicators, physical and technical readiness of archers · V.V. Artiuh, Zh.L. Kozina, V.O. Koval, D.V. Safronov, S.V. Fomin, Yu.O. Novikov
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2020
For Archers Published later
Forty youngsters aged nine to thirteen at their first recreational archery lessons in Konya, twelve hours over four weeks: the Bourdon test score goes from 62.7 ± 20.9 to 87.4 ± 19.3 (t = -10.12, p < 0.001). No control group, a repeated test and a journal with questionable editorial standards.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2020
Against Archers Published later
The same study contains its own limitation: at the pre-test the nine to eleven year olds score 55.1 ± 17.8 and the twelve to fourteen year olds 82.7 ± 14.2, that is twenty-eight points of difference from age alone, more than the average gain of twenty-five points attributed to the course. With no control, a month of practice cannot be told apart from growing up.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2020
Context Archers Published later
In the same group the improvement is similar with the modern bow, from 60.7 to 86.4, and with the traditional one, from 64.8 to 88.4, without the authors comparing the two directly.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2020
Context Archers Published later
The gain appears in the girls, from 60.9 to 86.1, and in the boys, from 64.6 to 88.7, both with p < 0.001.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2020
Context Archers Published later
The score rises in both age bands, with a larger gain in the younger ones, plus 27.4 points between nine and eleven against plus 17.4 between twelve and fourteen. Those who start lower gain more, which is also what a retaken test does.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2020
Context Archers Published later
The gain appears in all four subgroups of ten youngsters by sex and bow type, with p always below 0.003. That regularity is the best thing about this study, and it is not enough to take the place of a control group.
The Effect of Recreative Purpose Modern and Traditional Archery Education on Attention Parameters in Adolescents Questionable venue · Ferhat Ustun, Erdal Tasgin
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2022
For Archers Published later
Twenty-six beginner sport science students on a basic course of forty-eight hours over eight weeks, against twenty controls: on the d2 test the total score goes from 329.1 ± 58.5 to 463.7 ± 54.7, while the control goes from 346.0 ± 46.9 to 361.1 ± 56.1 (post-test comparison t = 6.218, p < 0.001), and concentration from 37.1 to 144.4 against 36.9 to 56.7. Groups not assigned at random and a control with no alternative activity.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
For Archers Published later
In those same participants the percentage error on the d2 falls from 28.1 ± 7.6 to 9.4 ± 6.6, against 28.3 ± 7.0 to 25.3 ± 6.4 in the control (t = -8.111, p < 0.001). It is not only a matter of speed: they make fewer mistakes.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
For Archers Published later
In the same study concentration grows far more than attention speed: the attention score rises between 34 and 42 per cent across subgroups, concentration between 205 and 382. Gains of that order on a cognitive test are unusual, and there is a reason to distrust them: at the first test concentration started from 37, when in an adult it normally sits between 150 and 180, and the initial error rate was 28 per cent in both groups. Those figures point to a problem in how the test was given rather than to an attention deficit, and the person giving it was also the course coach.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
For Archers Published later
In the same study attention also becomes steadier over time: the fluctuation rate falls from 25.0 ± 11.5 to 18.6 ± 6.1 in the participants (t = 2.940, p = 0.007) and rises from 25.8 ± 9.7 to 29.5 ± 9.5 in the controls, with the post-test comparison at t = -4.425. It is the same thing seen in the 2026 work on inattentive students.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
Context Archers Published later
On the same course men and women improve similarly: at the post-test the attention score is 468.1 ± 61.6 in men and 458.6 ± 47.4 in women, a difference that is not significant.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
Context Archers Published later
What makes that study credible is the control: in the twenty students who did not take the course, none of the seven d2 indices changes over eight weeks, in no subgroup of sex, age or dominant eye. It is the only control group in this set that does not improve by retaking the test.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
Context Archers Published later
On the same course the gain appears at every age in the sample, from twenty-one to twenty-four, with attention between plus 30 and plus 56 per cent, and at the post-test the ages do not differ from one another.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
Context Archers Published later
The distribution shifts as a block: before the course 77 per cent of the participants were classed as poor and none above average; afterwards 19 per cent are very good, 42 normal or good and only two students remain poor. In the controls it goes from fifteen poor to thirteen.
Temel Okçuluk Eğitiminin Dikkat ve Konsantrasyon Yetisine Etkisi · Üstün Türker
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2022
Context Other sport Published later
A dataset descriptor on national-level precision athletes and student peers: in a vigilance task the athletes' P300 response is larger, 9.91 ± 6.05 against 6.7 ± 3.31 microvolts with p < 0.05. The athletes are fifteen across shooting, archery and modern pentathlon, so it is not a comparison between archers and controls.
A simultaneous electroencephalography and eye-tracking dataset in elite athletes during alertness and concentration tasks · Xinzhen Pei, Guiying Xu, Yunhui Zhou, Luna Tao, Xiaozhu Cui, Zhenyu Wang, Bingru Xu, An-Li Wang, Xi Zhao, Haijun Dong, Yan An, Yang Cao, Ruxue Li, Honglin Hu, Yuguo Yu
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2022
Context Other sport Published later
In the same dataset the advantage disappears where it would matter: faced with the stimulus to catch, athletes and students show the same amplitude, 17.05 against 16.44 microvolts with p above 0.05. The advantage appears only on the stimuli to be ignored.
A simultaneous electroencephalography and eye-tracking dataset in elite athletes during alertness and concentration tasks · Xinzhen Pei, Guiying Xu, Yunhui Zhou, Luna Tao, Xiaozhu Cui, Zhenyu Wang, Bingru Xu, An-Li Wang, Xi Zhao, Haijun Dong, Yan An, Yang Cao, Ruxue Li, Honglin Hu, Yuguo Yu
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2022
Context Other sport Published later
Those same athletes also respond slightly earlier, with a latency of 261 against 273 milliseconds, but the authors report no test on that twelve millisecond difference.
A simultaneous electroencephalography and eye-tracking dataset in elite athletes during alertness and concentration tasks · Xinzhen Pei, Guiying Xu, Yunhui Zhou, Luna Tao, Xiaozhu Cui, Zhenyu Wang, Bingru Xu, An-Li Wang, Xi Zhao, Haijun Dong, Yan An, Yang Cao, Ruxue Li, Honglin Hu, Yuguo Yu
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2022
Context Other sport Published later
The limitation that belongs beside every figure in that dataset: of sixteen shooting and archery athletes, six are archers, and the comparison published is between mixed athletes and students. It says nothing about archers in particular.
A simultaneous electroencephalography and eye-tracking dataset in elite athletes during alertness and concentration tasks · Xinzhen Pei, Guiying Xu, Yunhui Zhou, Luna Tao, Xiaozhu Cui, Zhenyu Wang, Bingru Xu, An-Li Wang, Xi Zhao, Haijun Dong, Yan An, Yang Cao, Ruxue Li, Honglin Hu, Yuguo Yu
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2023
For Archers Published later
Seventy-two children aged nine to eleven in Shanghai, thirty-six with a forty-five minute session of Chinese archery and thirty-six with walking and classroom tasks: in the attentional control task reaction times improve more in the group that shot, F = 17.48 on congruent trials and F = 9.14 on incongruent ones, with small to moderate effects. It is the effect of one session, not of a practice.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
For Archers Published later
In those same children switching from one rule to another also improves: reaction times in the flexibility task give F between 6.16 and 7.64, and accuracy improves only on the trials where the rules are mixed, F = 13.4.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
Against Archers Published later
A good part of the improvement comes without shooting at all: in the control group congruent trials go from 542.6 ± 91.9 to 504.3 ± 63.3 ms (p = 0.00) and the easier memory task from 1010 to 899 ms. In the archery group the gain is larger, from 559.0 to 472.1 ms, but half the distance is covered by time alone.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
Against Archers Published later
In the between-group comparison, accuracy on the simpler flexibility tasks does not change: colour trials F = 0.13 with p = 0.72 and shape trials F = 1.1 with p = 0.30, while the effect appears only on the mixed trials, F = 13.4. The same holds for the times on the easier memory task, p = 0.34.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
Context Archers Published later
Inside the group that shot, accuracy improves only where the task is hard: incongruent trials go from 86.6 to 93.6 per cent (p = 0.03) while congruent ones do not move, and in the flexibility task colour and shape trials stay identical.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
Context Archers Published later
The most honest comparison in the whole study runs the other way: in the children who stayed in the classroom, accuracy on the more demanding memory task worsens over the morning, from 67.3 to 62.4 per cent, while those who shot go from 70.7 to 75.7. Part of the advantage is a decline avoided, not a gain.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
Context Archers Published later
The effect sizes of that session run between 0.01 and 0.22 of partial eta squared, that is small to moderate and never large. Worth remembering when reading the gains of 200 or 300 per cent in the uncontrolled studies.
The Effect of a Single Bout of Chinese Archery on Core Executive Functions in Preadolescent Children in Shanghai · Jianjun Liu, Surasak Taneepanichskul, Bo Zhang, Peter Xenos
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2023
For Archers Published later
A hundred Turkish children aged ten to fourteen, fifty registered archers and fifty who have just arrived: on the Bourdon test the registered ones score 101.7 ± 11.5 and the others 83.8 ± 10.4 (t = 8.154, p < 0.001). It is a cross-sectional comparison, so it does not separate the effect of shooting from who stays in the sport, and the length of practice is not reported.
Okçuluk Sporunun Çocuklarda Motor Beceri Ve Dikkat Üzerine Etkisinin Araştırılması · Zehra Gözel
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2023
Context Archers Published later
In those same hundred children the gap widens in the final part of the test, 33.8 against 25.8, where the beginners fall away and become far more erratic, with a standard deviation more than twice that at the start. What separates the two groups is holding on, more than starting.
Okçuluk Sporunun Çocuklarda Motor Beceri Ve Dikkat Üzerine Etkisinin Araştırılması · Zehra Gözel
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2024
For Archers Published later
Six Californian adolescents aged fourteen to seventeen who shoot, against eight who never have, on a self-administered smartphone cancellation test: with letters the archers score 0.908 ± 0.044 against 0.846 ± 0.048 (p = 0.031). Fourteen people, a cross-sectional design, no control of the testing environment, an unreviewed student preprint.
The Effects of Archery Practice on Sustained and Selective Attentional Processes Questionable venue · Olivia Park
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2024
Context Archers Published later
In the same sample, with pictures instead of letters the difference disappears, 0.903 against 0.859 with p = 0.154, and there are no differences by sex or school year. One result out of two very similar tasks.
The Effects of Archery Practice on Sustained and Selective Attentional Processes Questionable venue · Olivia Park
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2024
Context Archers Published later
What really separates the two small groups is the spread: the scores of the six archers are high and tight, between 0.863 and 0.977, while those of the eight non-archers run from 0.757 to 0.900 and none exceeds 0.90. With six and eight people that is a description, not an estimate.
The Effects of Archery Practice on Sustained and Selective Attentional Processes Questionable venue · Olivia Park
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2025
Against Archers Published later
Twenty adult beginners aged twenty-two or twenty-three assigned at random to six weeks of shooting at three metres, twenty-five to thirty-five arrows a session, or to no activity: reaction times improve in both groups and the time by group interaction is absent, on the congruent Stroop F = 0.03 with p = 0.865, on the incongruent one F = 0.005 with p = 0.947, on choice reaction F = 1.997 with p = 0.175. Ten per group and an inactive control.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Against Archers Published later
In the same study, on the choice reaction test the times do not fall in either group beyond what time itself does, effect of time F = 3.607 with p = 0.074: from 526.5 ± 85.1 to 519.8 ± 60.9 ms in those who shot and from 578.6 ± 94.8 to 532.9 ± 62.6 in the controls.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
This is the measurement that explains almost every favourable result on this page: repeating the same tests after six weeks the times fall even with nothing done at all, main effect of time F = 5.74 with p = 0.028 on the congruent condition and F = 7.70 with p = 0.012 on the incongruent one, with the controls going from 910 to 811 ms and from 984 to 866 ms.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
The only thing that moves in that study is inside the EEG: during the Stroop, alpha activity changes differently in the two groups, interaction F = 5.05 with p = 0.04, with higher power in the group that shot at one frontal electrode. It is a hint of mechanism, with no advantage in performance at all.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
On the choice reaction test six weeks of shooting move neither alpha, p = 0.92, nor beta, p = 0.27: only an interaction on theta across electrodes remains, p = 0.02.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
In the Stroop task the theta wave comes out more synchronised in those who shot at two electrodes only, with the effect of time non-existent, F = 0.05 with p = 0.82. An effect at two electrodes, after looking at fourteen channels, is the kind of result that needs replicating before it gets told.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
In the same task beta activity does not change at all after six weeks of shooting, with neither main effects nor interactions.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
On the choice reaction test frontal theta synchronisation moves in opposite directions in the two groups, higher in those who shot at one electrode and lower at another, with three-way interactions. Figures of this kind describe the noise of a sample of ten per group.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Context Archers Published later
The most serious limitation of that study comes before it starts: the two groups already differed at baseline, with higher alpha modulation at five electrodes in the group that went on to shoot. With ten people per arm, chance is not enough to even things out.
Effectiveness of Archery Training on Attention and Cognitive Function: An Electroencephalography (EEG) Study · Liya Khaulah Asy-Syaimaa' Binti Hussain, Azmin Sham Rambely, Nor Azila Noh
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2025
Against Archers Published later
Eighty Turkish children aged nine to fourteen split into four groups, those who only shoot, those who shoot and play another sport, those who play only another sport and those who play none: on the Bourdon test the scores are 89.7, 93.9, 90.6 and 89.9, with H = 1.378 and p = 0.711. Cross-sectional, small groups and of differing ages.
Okçuluk Yapan ve Yapmayan Çocuklarda Dikkat Seviyesi, Reaksiyon Hızı ve Akademik Başarının Karşılaştırılması Okçuluk Yapan Çocuklarda Akademik Başarı · Gökçen Akyürek, Fatma Öztürk
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2025
Context Archers Published later
In those same eighty children, reaction times do not separate the groups either: the auditory one runs between 464 and 486 ms with p = 0.781, and anticipation reaction gives p = 0.458. Whatever sport they play, the values sit around half a second.
Okçuluk Yapan ve Yapmayan Çocuklarda Dikkat Seviyesi, Reaksiyon Hızı ve Akademik Başarının Karşılaştırılması Okçuluk Yapan Çocuklarda Akademik Başarı · Gökçen Akyürek, Fatma Öztürk
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2025
Context Archers Published later
Ten Filipino secondary school students with at least a year of programme and competition behind them, interviewed one by one: they describe becoming more focused, patient and calm. It is what they report about themselves, with no measurement at all, and it counts as a description of the experience.
Bullseye: Documenting the Voices of Junior High School Archery Athletes · Ia Sairah Rafales Nallos, Susan P. Losaňes
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2026
Against Archers Published later
Thirty-eight Chinese archers at provincial or national level, with about nine years of practice, against thirty-eight basketball players and thirty-eight sedentary peers: on the Stroop interference test the archers score 42.8 ± 7.6 against 48.1 ± 12.1 for the sedentary group and 48.0 ± 8.3 for the basketball players, p = 0.023. They do not do better than the sedentary group, they do slightly worse. Cross-sectional, so it does not separate training from self-selection.
Do archery athletes’ hand dexterity, strength, and cognition exceed those of age-matched athletes and non-athletes? A cross-sectional study · Xinpeng Gao, Fuxin Hong, Jinlong Hou, Yanan Gao, Qianqian Han, Ming Li
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2026
Against Archers Published later
In the same comparison the general cognitive screen does not favour the archers either: 26.9 ± 2.7 against 27.3 ± 1.7 for the sedentary group, p = 0.422, and 28.5 ± 1.2 for the basketball players, p = 0.001. If practice trained attention in general, it ought to show here.
Do archery athletes’ hand dexterity, strength, and cognition exceed those of age-matched athletes and non-athletes? A cross-sectional study · Xinpeng Gao, Fuxin Hong, Jinlong Hou, Yanan Gao, Qianqian Han, Ming Li
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2026
Context Archers Published later
The detail that explains the result: the archers are slower than the others even at simply naming colours, 68.2 ± 11.3 against 73.7 and 76.3, p = 0.006. The disadvantage is not about interference control but about how many items they complete.
Do archery athletes’ hand dexterity, strength, and cognition exceed those of age-matched athletes and non-athletes? A cross-sectional study · Xinpeng Gao, Fuxin Hong, Jinlong Hou, Yanan Gao, Qianqian Han, Ming Li
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2026
Context Archers Published later
Confirming this, on the Stroop tests the archers make no more mistakes than the others: errors are indistinguishable across the three tasks, with p between 0.227 and 0.923. The lower score comes from speed, not accuracy.
Do archery athletes’ hand dexterity, strength, and cognition exceed those of age-matched athletes and non-athletes? A cross-sectional study · Xinpeng Gao, Fuxin Hong, Jinlong Hou, Yanan Gao, Qianqian Han, Ming Li
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2026
For Archers Published later
Fifteen children aged nine to twelve at a primary school in South Jakarta, six one-hour lessons: on the concentration grid test they find on average 2.33 ± 2.1 numbers before and 9.47 ± 4.6 after (Z = -3.327, p = 0.001). A single group, no control and a test that improves on retaking.
The Effect of Archery Activities on Concentration Levels in Elementary School Children · Nadya Dwi Oktafiranda, Ramdan Pelana, Dinan Mitsalina, Dzulfiqar Diyananda, Ela Yuliana
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2026
Context Archers Published later
The starting point of those children was very low: in one minute, on a grid of a hundred numbers, they found just over two, with a maximum of five. From a level like that any familiarity with the task produces a jump.
The Effect of Archery Activities on Concentration Levels in Elementary School Children · Nadya Dwi Oktafiranda, Ramdan Pelana, Dinan Mitsalina, Dzulfiqar Diyananda, Ela Yuliana
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2026
Context Archers Published later
After the six lessons the differences between children widen rather than narrow: the standard deviation goes from 2.1 to 4.6 and the maximum from five to seventeen. The response is not uniform, and the averages in these studies hide those who do not move.
The Effect of Archery Activities on Concentration Levels in Elementary School Children · Nadya Dwi Oktafiranda, Ramdan Pelana, Dinan Mitsalina, Dzulfiqar Diyananda, Ela Yuliana
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2026
For Review Published later
A systematic review of fifteen intervention studies on archers brings in a before and after on twenty-four Chinese archers split into three groups of eight by result: after work on posture, standardised movement and stretching, attention measured by EEG rises, and rises more in the group that was already shooting better. No control group, and the figure is read second hand inside the review.
Systematic Review of Exercise Interventions in Archery: Injury Management and Performance Outcomes · Ambusam Subramaniam, Fairus Fariza Zainudin, Mon Redee Sut Txi
Status history
- 2012 Not studied No one in the registry's bibliography has yet measured a person's attention before and after a period of archery: there is neither a before and after nor a comparison with people who do not shoot. The question circulates in presentations of the sport, not in studies.
- 2017 Contradicted Two results of opposite sign arrive in the same year, and neither carries much weight. After twelve weeks of lessons, students at a Turkish secondary school say in interview that they feel more attentive and focused, but it is a reported perception with no attention test at all. In sixty-five young Russian archers, by contrast, years of practice do not separate any of the tests administered, and there the tests were there. The only actual test points against, and the other datum is a reported perception that tests nothing: contradicted.
- 2018 Contradicted The first measurement with a randomised design arrives and finds nothing: two months of shooting training, with or without balance exercises, leave the attention tables unchanged in twenty-two Ukrainian beginner archers. The status does not change, but the picture tilts, because from here on the gains come from the weaker designs and the nulls from the few randomised studies.
- 2020 Contested The study with the most striking gain and the weakest design arrives. Forty youngsters aged nine to thirteen at their first recreational archery lessons improve by twenty-five points on the Bourdon test after a month, twelve hours in all, with no control group, and the gain appears in all four subgroups of sex and bow type. The same study, though, carries its own limitation inside it: between nine and fourteen the baseline score rises by twenty-eight points with age, that is more than the average gain produced by the course. It is the first favourable result measured with an attention test, and with the contrary studies of 2017 and 2018 the studies of archers now point in opposite directions: the status moves to contested, but the move is fragile, because it rests on a before and after with no control in a journal with questionable editorial standards.
- 2022 Contested The first favourable study with a control group arrives: twenty-six adult beginners take a basic course of forty-eight hours over eight weeks and on the d2 test the attention score rises by 41 per cent and concentration by 289, while in the twenty controls none of the seven indices moves; attention also becomes steadier, with fluctuation falling in the participants and rising in the controls. It is the best result in favour, but the groups are not assigned at random and the control does no alternative activity. On the other side, a Chinese dataset on precision athletes shows that the brain-response advantage appears only on non-target stimuli and disappears on target ones, and that its archer subgroup is six people mixed in with rifle and pistol shooters. It stays contested.
- 2023 Contested Seventy-two children in Shanghai are added, who after a single forty-five minute session improve in attentional control and in switching from one rule to another against an active control group, and a hundred Turkish children where the registered ones have higher attention than peers who have just arrived, with the gap widening in the final part of the test. The favourable evidence is no longer only before and after. But the picture cracks from the inside: the effects are small to moderate, they appear only in the cognitively demanding conditions, and on the easy tasks the control group improves too. With the randomised null of 2018 still standing, the status stays contested.
- 2024 Contested The year's only favourable result is also the weakest imaginable: six Californian adolescents who shoot, compared with eight who never have, on a cancellation test taken on a smartphone. With letters the archers do better, 0.908 against 0.846 with p = 0.031; with pictures the difference disappears, p = 0.154. Fourteen people in all, a cross-sectional design that says nothing about cause, and an unreviewed student preprint. The status does not move.
- 2025 Contested The year brings the two firmest null results the question has. Twenty adult beginners are assigned at random to six weeks of shooting or to no activity: reaction times improve in both groups and the time by group interaction does not exist, on the congruent Stroop (p = 0.865), the incongruent one (p = 0.947) or choice reaction (p = 0.175). It is the clean demonstration that the improvement in uncontrolled designs is familiarity with the test, and what really changes is only the theta wave on two electrodes, in two groups that already differed before they began. Alongside it, eighty Turkish children split between those who shoot, those who shoot and play another sport, those who play only another sport and those who play none do not differ on the Bourdon test, p = 0.711. On the other side only the accounts remain: ten Filipino students who say in interview that they are more focused, patient and calm. The picture leans against, but the one instrumental result in favour with a control group has been neither replicated nor directly refuted: contested.
- 2026 Contested The disagreement widens and holds. In favour stand a before and after on fifteen primary school children after six lessons, with no control group and with a test that improves on retaking, and a systematic review of exercise interventions that brings in a before and after on twenty-four Chinese archers, where attention measured by EEG rises more in the third who were already shooting better: here too with no control, and read second hand. Against stand thirty-eight Chinese archers at provincial or national level who on Stroop tests do no better than sedentary peers and worse than basketball players, and the eighty Turkish children in whom those who practise archery alone do not stand out on any attention index. The status stays contested.
Related
Related articles
- Concentration in archery: how it is measured, how much it matters and whether it can be trainedWhat studies on archers say about concentration: how it is measured, whether it tracks score, whether it fades late in a round and whether it can be trained.
- Does archery improve children's attention? What the studies have measuredArchery and children's attention: courses with no comparison group show gains, randomised studies find no effect, and only one study looks at grades.
Research lines
Cite
Campagna, M. (2026). Practising archery improves attention and concentration (Version 2). In Evidence Registry. Retrieved 16 October 2026, from https://matteocampagna.com/en/registry/mind/archery-attention-and-concentration
@misc{campagna2026_arcoattenzioneconcentrazione,
author = {Campagna, Matteo},
title = {Practising archery improves attention and concentration},
year = {2026},
howpublished = {Evidence Registry, matteocampagna.com},
url = {https://matteocampagna.com/en/registry/mind/archery-attention-and-concentration},
note = {Version 2; accessed 2026-10-16}
}
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