AUTHOR=Luis-del Campo Vicente , Morenas Martín Jesús , Musculus Lisa , Raab Markus 

TITLE=Embodied planning in climbing: how pre-planning informs motor execution

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=Volume 15 - 2024

YEAR=2024

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1337878

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1337878

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=The aim of the study addresses embodied planning in climbing. Embodied planning was conceptualized as the interaction between perceptual-cognitive pre-planning and motor execution. In an experimental study, eighteen climbers were asked to pre-plan a climbing route and to perform the route afterward. During pre-planning the visual search pattern of climbers was captured using eye-tracking. After previewing they were invited to climb the wall. Results revealed that holds looked at during pre-planning, were used twice as much during route execution than those not looked at. The duration of fixations was longer for holds used than those not used during route execution. Experience of climbers (training years) correlated with visual strategies and climbing performance such that experienced participants climbed faster and fixated shorter on the holds not used. Therefore, visual behaviors of climbers were influenced by their past sensorimotor experiences during route previewing, impacting subsequent climbing performance.