The effects of attentional shift training on the execution of soccer skills: A preliminary investigation.

Four college soccer players got attentional shift training. The coach used a multiple-baseline design across players. Each athlete practiced moving his eyes quickly between ball, teammates, and space on the field. Sessions happened on the regular practice pitch with real balls and cones.

Every player hit more accurate passes and shots after the eye-shift drills. The gains showed up right when training started for each athlete. Skills stayed sharp when the team moved back to normal practice.

Huguenin (2000) ran a similar drill with teens who had severe ID. Longer single-stimulus warm-ups plus conflict compound cues wiped out their overselective looking. The same principle—repeatedly practice switching focus—works for both star athletes and learners with disabilities.

Kennedy (2004) later showed that even toddlers can learn to watch several cues at once if pretraining is long enough. Again, the method matches Carr (1994): conditional-discrimination trials on a screen or on a field both teach broader attention.

Kaland et al. (2008) looks like a contradiction: kids with AS/HFA lost focus on the Wisconsin Card Sort. The difference is measurement. Nils used a one-shot test; G used daily practice. Brief tests flag problems; daily drills fix them.

You can borrow the eye-shift package tomorrow. Start with five extra ball-looking drills before the main task. Add quick “look-left, look-right” calls during play. Track one skill—pass completion—and you have a mini-replication. It works for neurotypical clients and, with longer pretraining, for kids with ID too.