When imagining the shot, an elite archer's brain recruits fewer areas than a non-archer's

The summary today

Two Korean studies from the same research group have put elite archers and people who have never shot in an MRI scanner to imagine the shot, and they reach different pictures. In the first, from 2010, the non-archers switch on a wide network, premotor and primary motor cortex, supplementary motor area, parietal and inferior frontal cortex, basal ganglia and cerebellum, while the eighteen elite archers activate almost only the supplementary motor area, and no area is more active in them than in the others; the reported difficulty of the imagery is the same in both groups. In the second, from 2014, with twelve medallists from the Olympics, Asian Games and World Championships, the elite network is no smaller than that of the people who have never shot, and each group has areas more active than the others: the medallists in the supplementary motor area, the middle frontal cortex, the temporoparietal areas and the cerebellum, the non-archers in frontal areas, the posterior cingulate and the basal ganglia. The elite imagining the shot with almost a single area therefore rests on one study, and the second, with a slightly different task centred on the moment of release, does not find it.

Also phrased as: "neural efficiency in archers"; "visualising the shot"; "motor imagery in archery"; "champions use less brain"

Evidence

• 2010
  For Archers Published later

  18 elite Korean archers (6 men and 12 women, more than ten years of shooting, five in the national team) and 18 people who had never competed imagine their own shot in the first person inside an MRI scanner: in the non-archers the premotor cortex (1,695 and 1,109 voxels), inferior parietal cortex (1,252 and 534), basal ganglia (1,059 and 1,058), cerebellum (422 and 897) and supplementary motor area (1,133 and 1,134) switch on, in the archers almost only the supplementary motor area (588 voxels on the left, 76 on the right), at p < 0.05 FDR corrected. In the direct comparison no area is more active in the archers, and the reported difficulty of the imagery is the same (2.37 against 2.45 out of 7, p = 0.41).

  Neural correlates of motor imagery for elite archers · Yongmin Chang, Jae-Jun Lee, Jee-Hye Seo, Hui-Jin Song, Yang-Tae Kim, Hui Joong Lee, Hye Jung Kim, Jongmin Lee, Woojong Kim, Minjung Woo, Jin Gu Kim

• 2014
  For Archers Published later

  12 women archers with medals from the Olympics, Asian Games and World Championships, 14 university archers and 14 people who had never shot imagine the whole shot in front of a simulated target at 70 metres and press a button at the moment of the imagined release: those who have never shot activate the superior and inferior frontal cortex, the ventral prefrontal cortex, the posterior cingulate, the precuneus, the basal ganglia and the cerebellum more than the archers, with a correction for multiple comparisons. The medallists are all women and older, but the result does not change after allowing for age and sex.

  An fMRI Study of Differences in Brain Activity Among Elite, Expert, and Novice Archers at the Moment of Optimal Aiming · Woojong Kim, Yongmin Chang, Jingu Kim, Jeehye Seo, Kwangmin Ryu, Eunkyung Lee, Minjung Woo, Christopher M. Janelle

• 2014
  Against Archers Published later

  In the same study the elite network is not almost only the supplementary motor area: in the medallists both primary motor cortices, the temporoparietal and somatosensory areas, insula, thalamus, basal ganglia, anterior cingulate and the dentate nucleus of the cerebellum also switch on, a network no smaller than that of the people who have never shot (supplementary motor area, middle frontal cortex, ventral premotor, temporoparietal, somatosensory and auditory cortex, insula and anterior cingulate). In the comparison between groups the medallists are more active than the university archers and the non-archers in the right supplementary motor area, the middle frontal cortex, the temporoparietal areas and the cerebellum: the smaller network is not repeated.

  An fMRI Study of Differences in Brain Activity Among Elite, Expert, and Novice Archers at the Moment of Optimal Aiming · Woojong Kim, Yongmin Chang, Jingu Kim, Jeehye Seo, Kwangmin Ryu, Eunkyung Lee, Minjung Woo, Christopher M. Janelle

Status history

1. 1990 Not studied In the registry's bibliography nobody has yet looked inside an archer's brain while they imagine their own shot: visualisation is taught, but what it switches on has not been measured.
2. 2010 Reported Eighteen elite archers, with more than ten years of practice and five from the Korean national team, and eighteen people who have never competed imagine their own shot in the first person inside an MRI scanner. The non-archers switch on a wide network: premotor and primary motor cortex, supplementary motor area, parietal and inferior frontal cortex, basal ganglia and cerebellum. The elite archers activate almost only the supplementary motor area, mostly on the left (588 voxels against 1,133 in the same area in the non-archers, who also count, for example, 1,695 in the left premotor cortex), and no area is more active in them. The reported difficulty of the imagery is the same, 2.37 against 2.45 out of 7. It is a single cross-sectional comparison: reported.
3. 2014 Contested The same Korean group repeats the test with twelve women archers who had won medals at the Olympics, Asian Games and World Championships, fourteen university archers and fourteen people who have never shot, who imagine the shot in front of a simulated target at 70 metres and press a button at the moment of release. Part of the result points the same way as in 2010: those who have never shot activate the superior and inferior frontal cortex, the ventral prefrontal cortex, the posterior cingulate, the basal ganglia and the cerebellum more than the archers. The core of the claim, however, is not repeated: the medallists switch on a wide network, with both primary motor cortices, the somatosensory areas, the insula, the thalamus, the basal ganglia and the cerebellum, no smaller than that of the non-archers, and in the supplementary motor area, the middle frontal cortex, the temporoparietal areas and the cerebellum they are more active than the other two groups. One study finds that the elite use far fewer areas, the other finds different networks but not smaller ones: contested.

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