SINKING BASKETBALL FREETHROWS THROUGH MENTAL PRACTICE

• By: Louis Ochiel
• Date: October 24, 2022

Realizing that our actions, feelings, and behavior are the result of our own images and beliefs gives us the lever that psychology has always needed for changing personality. It opens a new psychological door to gaining skill, success, and happiness. Mental pictures offer us an opportunity to "practice" new traits and attitudes, which otherwise we could not do. This is possible because, again, your nervous system cannot tell the difference between an actual experience and one that is vividly imagined. If we picture ourselves performing in a certain manner, it is the same as the actual performance.

Research Quarterly reported an experiment on the effects of mental practice on improving skill in sinking basketball free-throws. One group of students that practiced throwing the ball everyday for 20 days was scored on the first and last days

A second group was scored on the first and last days but engaged in no sort of practice.

A third group was scored on the first day then spent 20 minutes a day imagining that they were throwing the ball into the hoop. When they missed, they would imagine that they corrected their aim accordingly.

The first group,which practiced 2o minutes every day, improved in scoring 24 percent.

The second group which had no sort of practice showed no improvement.

The third group, which practiced in their imagination improved in scoring 23 percent.