Routledge Handbook of Sport Expertise

Understanding and developing expertise is an important concern for any researcher or practitioner working in elite or high performance sport. Whether it's identifying talented young athletes or developing methods for integrating cutting-edge sport science into daily coaching practice, scientists, coaches and researchers all need to understand the skills, characteristics, and knowledge that distinguish the expert performer in sport. The Routledge Handbook of Sport Expertise is the first book to offer a comprehensive overview of current research and practice in the emerging field of sports expertise. Adopting a multi-disciplinary, multi-faceted approach, the book offers in-depth discussion of methodological and philosophical issues in sport expertise, as well as the characteristics that describe sporting 'experts' and how they can be facilitated and developed. Exploring research, theory and practice, the book also examines how scientists and practitioners can work together to improve the delivery of applied sport science. With contributions from many of the world's leading researchers in expertise and skill acquisition in sport, the Routledge Handbook of Sport Expertise is important reading for any advanced student, researcher, coach or sport science support officer looking to better understand this cutting-edge topic.

Joseph Baker is Associate Professor and Head of the Lifespan Health and Performance Laboratory in the School of Kinesiology and Health Science at York University, Canada. He has also held visiting researcher/professor positions in the Carnegie Research Institute at Leeds Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom, Victoria University and the Australian Institute of Sport in Australia, and the Institute of Sport Science at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster in Germany. His research considers the varying influences on optimal human development, ranging from issues affecting athlete development and skill acquisition to barriers and facilitators of successful aging. Joe is Past President of the Canadian Society for Psychomotor Learning and Sport Psychology and the author/editor of five books, two journal special issues and more than 100 peer reviewed articles and book chapters. Damian Farrow holds a joint appointment in Australia with Victoria University and the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) as Professor of Skills Aquisition. Appointed as the inaugural AIS Skill Acquisition Specialist and Discipline Head of Psychology and Skill Acquisition, he was responsible for research and support of coaches seeking to develop the skills of Australian athletes, and he works with a wide range of national sporting organisation high-performance programmes. Damian's research interests centre on understanding the factors critical to developing talent/sport expertise, with a specific focus on perceptual and decision-making skills and practice methodology. Damian has written over 80 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, six books, and made over 150 presentations at inter/national coaching and scientific conferences. He is an editorial board member of the Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport and the International Journal of Sports Science and Coaching and a member of sports science advisory panels for the Australian Football League, Cricket Australia, Tennis Australia, and Surfing Australia.

1. A [very brief] review of the historical foundations of sport expertise: an introduction to the handbook 2. Expert anticipation and pattern perception 3. Aiming for excellence: the quiet eye as a characteristic of expertise 4. On attentional control: A dimensional framework for attention in expert performance 5. Information-movement coupling as a hallmark of sport expertise 6. How experts make decisions in dynamic time-constrained sporting environments 7. Movement automaticity in sport 8. Expertise in the performance of multiarticular sports actions 9. Breadth and depth of knowledge in expert versus novice athletes 10. Psychological characteristics of expert performers 11. Physical qualities of experts 12. Expert performance in sport: an ecological dynamics perspective 13. Defining expertise: a taxonomy for researchers in skill acquisition and expertise 14. Issues in the collection of athlete training histories 15. Issues in the measurement of anticipation 16. Eye tracking methods in sport expertise 17. New methods for studying perception and action coupling 18. Methods for measuring pattern recall and recognition in sports experts 19. Capturing group tactical behaviors in expert team players 20. Methods for measuring breadth and depth of knowledge 21. Measuring psychological determinants of expertise: dispositional factors 22. Psychological determinants of expertise: emotional reactivity, psychological skills, and efficacy 23. Issues in the measurement of physiological and anthropometric factors 24. Issues and challenges in developing representative tasks in sport 25. Challenges to capturing expertise in field settings 26. Genomics of elite sporting performance 27. Diversification and deliberate play during the sampling years 28. Psychological characteristics and the developing athlete: the importance of self-regulation 29. Family and peer influences in the development of sport expertise 30. Deliberate practice in sport 31. Development of tactical creativity in sports 32. Birthdate and birthplace effects on expertise attainment 33. Career length, aging and expertise 34. Changing role of coaches across development 35. The Use of observation as a method to develop expertise in coaching and officiating 36. Five evidence-based principles of effective practice and instruction 37. Efficacy of training interventions for acquiring perceptual cognitive skill 38. The future of sport expertise research: barriers and facilitators in theory and practice