Perceptual-cognitive predictors of success
Young AFL players testing perceptual-cognitive skills

How do you know when a young athlete is starting out if they have what it takes to become part of the elite? Dr Job Fransen has found a way of assessing young athletes’ sport-specific perceptual-cognitive skill to predict future success in their chosen sport.

Working with the Sydney Swans Academy, Dr Fransen is measuring young Australian football athletes’ ability to make fast and accurate decisions using a lab-based task that closely replicates on-field performance scenarios. The research addresses today’s lack of knowledge around players’ psychosocial attributes and perceptual-cognitive ability as indicators of their potential success.

AFL ball at Swans Academy testing

In the UTS skill acquisition lab, researchers can use the virtual reality function and the simultaneous back and front projections of life-size images to simulate life-like game-play scenarios to accurately measure players’ perceptual-cognitive abilities.

Job Fransen

“The UTS facilities allow researchers to use more ecologically-valid testing protocols to measure players’ decision-making and help shape talent identification and development of future athletes.”

- Dr Job Fransen

Swans Academy player testing
Acknowledgement of Country

UTS acknowledges the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the Boorooberongal people of the Dharug Nation, the Bidiagal people and the Gamaygal people, upon whose ancestral lands our university stands. We would also like to pay respect to the Elders both past and present, acknowledging them as the traditional custodians of knowledge for these lands.