L19, Complex Systems in Sport

Question 1

Objectives:

• To understand key characteristics
• To conceptualise sports behaviours as complex systems
• To apply systems perspective to sports examples

Question 2

Why do we conceptualise human movement as a system?

Answer 2

Humans perform patterned, goal-directed behaviour. Patterns emerge on different levels (biomechanical: limb/muscle coordination… game: player coordination)

Question 3

What are the 3 constraints (Newell’s model of constraints)? Give an example/s:

Answer 3

1. Individual- Mood, how the body is feeling
2. Environmental- Weather, surface of play
3. Task- Changing the size of the field to alter strategic decisions

Question 4

What are interacting components?

Answer 4

• Complex systems consist of components that interact with each other and their environment
• The way they interact shapes the system’s behaviour
• System cannot be fully understood/predicted by studying the components in isolation

(“The whole is greater than the sum of its parts”)

Question 5

What is self-organisation?

Answer 5

• Ordered behaviour arising from interaction among system components
• Interaction rule executed using local information, without reference to global pattern
• Pattern emerges without top-down specification of patterns

E.g., Specific types of patterns in a football game such as a triangle or diamond shape in the midfield

Question 6

What is stability?

Answer 6

• Stable patterns may exist that the system is attracted toward
• Breaking from stable patterns requires significant perturbations or changes in the environment

E.g., Going from a walking pattern (stable) to changing the pattern when transitioning into a run/sprint

Question 7

Give an example of ordered movement:

Answer 7

Video of sheep flock shown in lecture: They move with each other as they work better in a group. They don’t want to be isolated on their own so we see movement patterns of sheep following other bigger grounds around them.

Question 8

Give an example of a change in stability during a tennis match:

Answer 8

A player having to change from slower movement in the middle of the court to running from right to left as the difficulty of shot return increases.