The Contextual Interference Effects in the Acquisition, Retention and Transfer of Three Volleyball Skills

This study was designed in order to investigate the effects of contextual interference (CI) in acquisition, retention and transfer of motor skills . 40 student of Tehran University (average age of 22.4±2) were voluntarily selected and randomly arranged in two experimental groups of 1 and 2 to investigate the effects and to comparise two methods of blocked practice (with low CI) and random practice (with high CI). The subjects in each group participated in 9 session of 3 kinds of volleyball serves with 378 repetitions in the acquisition phase. In 3 sessions, 45 acquisition tests were administered during the practice phase and after 5consecutive days and 7days, they participated in 15 repetitions of delayed retention test and 15 transfer tests. T test, ANOVA and repeated measure were used to analyze data. The results of the two experimental groups showed that the contextual interference effect was significant when the random group performance declined in the acquisition phase contextual interference test increased in delayed retention and transfer phases when compared with the blocked group retention test and transfer tests. These findings supported the second idea of progression of memory and different views of motor preparation with the high CI of training .