A Behavioral Study on the Effects of Closed- and Open-Skills Sport Practice on Proactive and Reactive Action Inhibition via a Mouse Tracking System

This study aimed to investigate the effect of different sport categories (open- and closed skills) on proactive and reactive inhibitory processes as two distinct components of motor inhibition. A mouse tracking procedure was employed to compare behavioural performance among three groups of participants (tennis players, swimmers and non-athletes) in non-sport-specific cued Go/No-Go (GNG) and Stop Signal Task (SST), which mainly engage proactive and reactive inhibitory control, respectively. Reaction times (RTs), inhibitory failures, and Stop Signal Reaction Times (SSRTs) were measured. To investigate dynamic aspects of inhibitory control, one-shot and non-one-shot movement profiles were analysed and compared among groups. Results showed no group differences in RTs in Go/No-Go and Stop conditions. SSRTs were significant shorter for athletes than non-athletes in SST, but no differences emerged for inhibitory failures in cued GNG. During inhibitory failures athletes showed higher proportion of non-one-shot movements than non-athletes in both tasks. Higher proportion of non-one-shot profiles was observed in cued GNG compared to SST. Finally, no differences between two sport categories were found in both tasks. Our findings suggest that both proactive and reactive inhibitory control do benefit from sport practice, but open- and closed-skills sports do not differ in influencing inhibitory processes. Also, movement profile analysis could be a promising, complementary behavioral analysis to integrate for more fine-grained evaluation and differentiation of inhibitory motor control in athletes, specifically when using GNG tasks.