The Influence of Intentional Focus of Attention on Learning Tennis Forehand in Children and Older Adults

Focus of attention, external and internal focus feedback has improved motor skill learning, but its effects are still questionable in children and older adults when learning tennis forehand skills. This study aimed to examine the influence of external and internal focus feedback on learning the tennis forehand skill in novice players of different ages. The participants, divided into two groups: children aged 10-12 and older adults aged 55-60, were instructed to focus on their movement patterns (stance, backswing, forward swing to contact point, and follow-through and finish) as well as the effects of their movements (external effect). All participants were novices and had no prior experience with this skill. They were split into four groups based on age and training condition. After 24 practice sessions over 60 days, the participants completed 40 retention trials following a 48-hour rest period. The experimental design used a two-way 2 (age) x 2 (practice group) x 3 (block of trials) analysis of variance (ANOVA) with repeated measures. These findings showed that older adults performed worse than children when using external focus feedback, and they showed superiority in internal focus feedback.