The specificity versus generality of ball-handling skills – Empirical evidence for a general ball-handling ability
Journal article, 2019

The purpose of this study was to investigate if ball-handling skills are specific and uncorrelated (i.e., motor specificity), or if they share an underlying ball-handling ability (i.e., motor generality). To empirically investigate this question, we had a sample of 201 adolescents perform 12 novel ball-handling tasks. Using confirmatory factor analysis, we showed that a model based on the assumptions of the generality perspective was superior to a model based on assumptions of specificity. The general ball-handling factor did significantly influence the performance on all 12 tasks, with factor loadings ranging between 0.39 and 0.79. The results and it's practical implications are discussed in relation to development of sport specific skills.

Specificity

Ball-handling

Skills

Abilities

Generality

Author

Pär Rylander

University of Gothenburg

Magnus Karlsteen

Chalmers, Physics, Materials Physics

Konstantin Kougioumtzis

University of Gothenburg

Jan-Eric Gustafsson

University of Gothenburg

Human Movement Science

0167-9457 (ISSN) 18727646 (eISSN)

Vol. 66 477-486

Subject Categories

Psychology (excluding Applied Psychology)

Applied Psychology

Other Civil Engineering

DOI

10.1016/j.humov.2019.05.024

PubMed

31176883

More information

Latest update

8/28/2020