The role of working memory capacity in soccer tactical decision making at different levels of expertise

Abstract

Athletic skills acquired through deliberate practice are essential for expert sports performance. Some authors even suggest that practice circumvents the limits of working memory capacity (WMC) in skill acquisition. However, this circumvention hypothesis has been challenged recently by the evidence that WMC plays an important role in expert performance in complex domains such as arts and sports. Here, we have used two dynamic soccer tactical tasks to explore the effect of WMC on tactical performance at different levels of expertise. As expected, professional soccer players exhibited better tactical performance than amateur and recreational players. Furthermore, WMC predicted faster and more accurate tactical decisions in the task under auditory distraction and faster tactical decisions in the task without distraction. Importantly, lack of expertise × WMC interaction suggests that the WMC effect exists at all levels of expertise. Our results speak against the circumvention hypothesis and support a model of independent contributions of WMC and deliberate practice on expert performance in sports.