Effects of public posting, goal setting, and oral feedback on the skills of female soccer players.
Post practice stats, set a group goal, and talk it through—teen soccer skills shoot up in drills but need extra help to stick on game day.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Brobst et al. (2002) worked with a girls’ high-school soccer team.
They taped every practice scrimmage and counted four target skills: traps, passes, tackles, and shots.
After each practice the coaches posted each girl’s scores on the locker-room wall, set a group goal for the next day, and gave quick oral feedback.
What they found
The package worked fast. Skill totals during scrimmages jumped as soon as the intervention started.
But on real game days the numbers barely moved. Practice gains did not carry over.
How this fits with other research
Allison et al. (1980) saw a 10-fold jump in football, gymnastics, and tennis skills with a similar behavioral package. Their athletes were younger and the coaches added brief time-outs and praise, which may explain the bigger leap.
Quinn et al. (2017) used public posting plus simple bar graphs with competitive dancers. Graphs replaced oral feedback, yet turns, kicks, and leaps still improved. The pattern shows the posting part drives change even when feedback style shifts.
Park et al. (2025) later taught autistic 5- to 8-year-olds to kick a soccer ball with plain BST (model, practice, feedback). No posters, no goals, yet every child learned. The contrast hints that public posting may matter more for teens who care about peer comparison.
Why it matters
If you coach teens, post their numbers and set a daily goal—skills rise fast in practice. Build in game-day probes and add extra reinforcement when the scoreboard is real so the gain travels to competition.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
We evaluated the effects of public posting, goal setting, and oral feedback on the skills of 3 female high school soccer players during practice scrimmages. The dependent variables were the percentage of appropriate responses when the player (a) kept and maintained possession of the ball, (b) moved to an open position during a game restart (e.g., goal or corner kick), and (c) moved to an open position after passing the ball. We also assessed the extent to which changes in practice performances generalized to games. A social validity questionnaire was completed by both players and coaches to assess the acceptability of the intervention's goals, procedures, and outcomes. Results indicate that the intervention was effective in improving performances during practice scrimmages but produced limited generalization to game settings.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 2002 · doi:10.1901/jaba.2002.35-247