Introduction: Past research revealed an impact of uniform colour in sports: Most notably, beneficial effects of the colour red in combat sports were reported (Hill & Barton, 2005). However, also Greenlees Eynon and Thelwell (2013) found a benefit in football`s penalty kicks: Penalty takers succeeded less often when facing a goalkeeper wearing a red instead of blue or green jersey. By deepening the approach of their field study, the current experiments were aimed at particularise our understanding of the impact of goalkeepers` but also of penalty takers` uniform colour. Methods: Twenty-four video clips showing a football player taking a penalty kick from the perspective of a goalkeeper (experiment 1) and 25 clips showing a goalkeeper preparing himself for saving a penalty from the perspective of the penalty taker (experiment 2) were recorded. Uniform colour of the players/goalkeepers were chromatically changed to red and blue. Each clip lasted four seconds and ended when the player kicked the ball. Thus, ball`s trajectory was not shown. Participants rated each clip twice: Once in a red condition, once in a blue condition. The order of the videos was randomized. Thirty-nine experienced male football players (25.64 ± 4.90 years) participated in experiment 1 and rated the level of players` resoluteness from 1 (minor) to 9 (high) and the position where the ball should hit the goal by using a 23-in. touch-screen. In experiment 2, 118 students of sport science (63 m/55 f, 22.25 ± 2.87 years) judged the videos following the same criteria as in experiment 1 but also rated the probability of success for saving the penalty kick from 1 (minor) to 9 (high). Results: Paired t-tests did not reveal significant differences for penalty takers wearing red versus blue in resoluteness and anticipated lateral position of the ball. However, for ball`s anticipated height a small effect was observed (T(38) = 2.42, p = .02, d = .16): The kicks of red-glad penalty takers were judged to be shot lower at the goal (M = 109,52 ± 12.75) than those of the blue-glad players (M = 111.69 ± 13.52). In experiment 2, no impact of goal keepers` uniform colour was found for resoluteness, probability of success and the anticipated position of the ball. Discussion: Both experiments did not find any impact of uniform colour on ratings of resoluteness and probability of success in penalty kicks. Thus, an experimental corroboration of the results of Greenlees et al. (2013) failed. However, a rather small effect was observed for the height of the anticipated ball position. Further research is needed to clarify the origin and significance of this effect more comprehensively.
© Copyright 2016 21st Annual Congress of the European College of Sport Science (ECSS), Vienna, 6. -9. July 2016. Julkaistu Tekijä University of Vienna. Kaikki oikeudet pidätetään. / Kääntänyt https://www.DeepL.com/Translator