Insignificant Influence of Sport Participation on Inhibitory Control Among Student Athletes in the Stop Signal Task

• Published in: Lecture Notes in Bioengineering
• Main Author: Azhan M.A.N.; Azaman A.; Khairizam S.H.S.M.; Miswan M.S.; Hasan H.; Zainuddin N.F.
• Format: Conference paper
• Language: English
• Published: Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH 2024
• Online Access: https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85200514730&doi=10.1007%2f978-981-97-3741-3_6&partnerID=40&md5=77f7e9592abb24774b72f9007f0c6747

Cognition was initially believed to be entirely governed by the central nervous system, with long-term potentiation and neurogenesis contributing to memory development and storage. In addition, cognitive function, particularly in sports, has gained popularity among researchers, with the current emphasis on comparing cognitive function and sports performance between different types of athletes. Therefore, this study aims to compare the cognitive functions of the inhibition stop signal task between elite and non-elite student athletes. A total of 48 student athletes from the Kedah State Sports Council and Universiti Teknologi MARA participated in this study. A preliminary survey and a computerized stop signal task from E-prime 3.0 were used in this study. Descriptive and statistical inferential methods were used in conjunction with Microsoft Excel 2020 and the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS 26.0 version). An equal variance t-test found insignificant statistical differences for mean go trial response time (GTRT) and mean stop signal response time (SSRT) between elite and non-elite participants. This result suggests that the criteria used to differentiate elite athletes from non-elite athletes, such as the number of hours or years of training completed, may need to be more precise to truly distinguish between elite and non-elite student athletes. For future studies, the stop signal task used in this study may require several modifications to ensure that a more reliable SSRT is achieved. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2024.