Attentional Focus Repercussions on AthletesâÃâ¬Ã⢠Performance: A SystematicReview

Athletes performance has been the subject of discussions and major investments in sports training aimed at preventing injury. The high performance of athletes depends on neuro-functional intrinsic factors. Recent studies have been exploring the process of attention to stimuli, through external and internal attentional focus tasks and its role in the performance of athletes. In this review, we explore a wider perspective of the influence of attentional focus on improving the performance of athletes. The study is based on the PRISMA guidelines, with search in databases: Pubmed, PEDro, Medline and Cochrane of studies published in the last 10 years. Articles were grouped according to the type of study, objective, a method of evaluation, intervention and main results. Methodological quality was evaluated with PEDro scale and survey resulted in 11 selected studies. The most used methodological model was the sample selection at random. Peter Scale demonstrated that only one study score greater than or equal to 6. Some factors have undermined the good methodological quality of selected studies, such as randomization and outcome measures, indicating that evidence about the use of external attentional focus for improved performance of athletes is not yet satisfactory.