Discussion
mood disturbances, anger, confusion, fatigue, anxiety, TOD, learning motor skills
The current study aimed to explore the effect of TOD (morning vs. late afternoon) and instructional visualizations (video vs. static pictures vs. static pictures enriched with motion-indicating arrows) in the acquisition of motor skills in a PE context (i.e., basketball game actions). The study highlights the morning's superiority in the acquisition of motor skills from dynamic and static visualizations, due to mood disturbances and lower arousal levels. Moreover, the study confirmed the superiority of dynamic over static visualisations in learning motor skills at both TOD, due to the activation of the mirror-neuron system. To our best of knowledge, the present investigation is the first to reveal such pattern of results.First, the results indicated that the morning presentation of all instructional materials led to better short-term learning compared to the late afternoon hours, thus confirming Hypothesis 1. In fact, learners performed better in the morning (between 08:00 and 09:00 h) rather than in the late afternoon (between 16:00 and 17:00 h), on the two immediate post-tests (i.e., game comprehension and game performance tests). These findings could be explained through the changes in mood states. Indeed, the present study results showed that learners indicated lower level of positive mood (i.e., vigor), and higher levels of negative moods (e.g., anxiety, fatigue, anger, and confusion), in the afternoon than in the morning. A mood disturbance is considered as a surrogate indication of mental fatigueSecond, the results showed that video led to superior STRP compared to both types of series of static pictures, at the two TOD, thus confirming Hypothesis 2. Learners exposed to video demonstration achieved higher levels of game comprehension and game performance, in comparison with those exposed to enriched static-pictures and static pictures conditions, at both TOD. These findings are in line with Höffler and Leutner ’s meta‐analysisIn spite of its speculative nature (as we did not report any neuro-physiological data in the results section), the automatic activation of the MNS seems a conceivable explanation for our results patterns. Indeed, the authors of this line of research studies have usually relied on the MNS hypothesis to argue the superiority of model-based videos over static pictures when learning about motor knowledge. According to Rajmohan and MohandasOn the other hand, concerning the two presentations of simultaneous static pictures, it appears that the addition of numbered arrow-symbols in static pictures led to greater short-term learning outcomes. In fact, learners who received enriched static pictures were able to recall the game actions (either in a sheet of paper or on a basketball half-court) significantly better than those who received a series of static pictures, at the two TOD. Although it is important to understand what information they depict, arrows are considered one of the best mediums to describe dynamic changesThe current results could be consequent to the chosen protocol. First, the selected participants were mostly females, so that each experimental condition contained (n = 5) males and (n = 15) females. Previous studies have reported that females outperformed males with instructional videos, while both genders performed similarly with simultaneous static pictures, when learning about motor skillsOn theoretical levels, the current study (i) extends the research-base examination of the diurnal variation of STRP, indicating the morning superiority in the acquisition of motor skills from dynamic and static visualizations, due to mood disturbances and the lower arousal circumstances, and (ii) contributes to the growing body of knowledge on the human movement effect, while indicating its stability at different TOD due to the activation of the MNS that helps human to learn motor knowledge by imitation. Indeed, the present investigation mainly showed that (a) the acquisition of basketball game actions from dynamic and static visualizations decreases throughout the day, to be better in the morning (between 08:00 and 09:00 h) compared to the late afternoon (between 16:00 and 17:00 h), (b) the video led to better acquisition of basketball game actions when compared with the simultaneous static pictures (either enriched with arrows or without arrows), at the two TOD. Consequently, on a practical level, the findings encourage PE teachers to use instructional videos, particularly in the morning, for communicating tactical skills in basketball. Otherwise, additional educational research should perhaps explore the effect of video modeling by experts combined with motor imagery (e.g.,