Postural cues, biological motion perception, and anticipation in sport

This chapter reviews more than four decades of research that has focused on identifying the postural cues that are crucial to anticipation in sport. It highlights research using traditional methods such as film-based temporal and spatial occlusion, point-light displays, and liquid crystal occlusion glasses to identify both when and what information is picked up during anticipation. The chapter examines body of research, grounded in ecological psychology and dynamical systems theory that makes use of sophisticated data analysis and modelling methods, such as principal component analysis to better identify how information is perceived and when and what information sources are important. A shortcoming with spatial and temporal occlusion is that they only provide information relating to the key information time windows and body regions underpinning anticipation. In order to understand the role of postural cue and biological motion perception in anticipation, it is necessary to use methodologies that capture whole-body movement and the multiple dynamics influencing the outcome of the action.