Understanding the acute and chronic effects of basketball dual-task complexity on athletes’ inhibitory capacity

Inhibitory control (IC) enables athletes to suppress inappropriate responses and shift attention during sport practice. However, how acute training effects on IC relate to chronic adaptations remains unclear. This study investigated whether cognitive-motor complexity during interventions fosters long-term adaptations and how IC capacity moderates outcomes. One hundred twenty-five healthy athletes (68 men, 57 women; mean age, 21.1 ± 1.8 years) were divided into high- and low-IC capacity groups and assigned to one of four basketball cognitive motor dual-task interventions, varying in executive demands and physical load. A repeated-measures design assessed the effects of 11 training sessions on IC and whether the effects remained after three months. High-capacity groups showed improved IC accuracy and response time in each session (p < 0.001), followed by low-capacity groups, initially under low executive demands (p < 0.001) and then high executive demands (p < 0.001). At three months, performance generally declined (p < 0.001), except in the high-capacity group under high-demand conditions, where it was maintained. Notably, the negative performance peak during interventions correlated with final IC assessment (p = 0.002). Cognitively demanding training enhanced IC in athletes with a higher baseline capacity, while less complex tasks were more effective for individuals with lower capacity. These findings support adapting task complexity to cognitive level to optimise cognitive development.