Acoustic cues in playing volleyball: Effects of the player’s characteristics to listen
to sounds carefully during the game
Takahiro Miura
1;, Katsumi Takahashi
2and Mari Ueda
21Human Augmentation Research Center (HARC), National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST),
6–2–3 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, 277–0882 Japan
2Kanagawa Institute of Technology (KAIT),
1030 Shimo-Ogino, Atsugi, 243–0292 Japan
(Received 19 October 2020, Accepted for publication 23 December 2020)
Keywords: Volleyball, Auditory information, Questionnaire survey, Receptions, Digs
1. Introduction
In many sport competitions where athletes handle a ball, they obtain information from the surroundings to play properly in a constantly changing situation. For example, they use the visual sense to grasp the direction of the ball and movement of players around it, the auditory sense to assess the situation, such as the sound of the ball being hit and the voices of players, and the tactile sense to determine whether they are in contact other players or objects in various actions, such as hitting, kicking, and catching the ball. Particularly, volleyball players alternatively or complementarily use various sounds for predicting the direction of the ball or body movement in the absence of visual information. However, conventional studies on volleyball do not mention the practical use of auditory information but mainly focus on skills and tech-niques, such as reception and spike, and the relationship among these techniques and associated muscles [1–4].
Therefore, the current study aims to clarify the current situations of the effective use of sound among volleyball players. A questionnaire survey was conducted on skilled or novice volleyball players to identify the play cases in which they utilize sounds. Based on the results of the premises, the practical use of sound in volleyball games is discussed.
2. Questionnaire survey 2.1. Overview of question items
The main items in the questionnaire are as follows: (i) Personal attributes: 10 questions about age, gender,
years of volleyball experience, height, current and experienced position, highest spike touch (a measure of the volleyball player’s skill in vertical jumping), and volleyball positions in high school or other high school club activities.
(ii) Time to listen to music: 10 questions about whether they listen to music before and after practice and regular games, genre of music, etc.
(iii) Use of sound during the game (5-point Likert scale; from 1 = Don’t care at all to 5 = Care at all): 40 questions about ascertaining the status of their team-mates and opponents. Table 1 provides the details.
(iv) Use of sound during the game (free descriptions): 24 questions about recognizing and predicting the situation of the ball during the game (free text).
The total number of questions is 84. 2.2. Participants and procedure
A total of 91 volleyball players (male = 79) participated in the survey. The mean age was 19:7 1:2 years. They belonged to the volleyball teams of the Kanagawa Institute of Technology, Sophia University, Kanagawa University, Tokyo University of Agriculture, Nihon University, and Bunkyo University. The questionnaire was distributed at practice matches and other joint training based on snowball sampling. Table 2 provides the positions they experienced. Except for four female caretakers, 87 participants were included in the analysis (Sect. 2.3). Five people of them experienced multiple positions. The participants had 1–15 years of experience in volleyball with a mean S.D. of 7:8 2:8 years. The mean height and highest spike touch were 174:9 7:6 cm (range: 156–191 cm) and 307:6 14:2 cm (range: 250–345 cm), respectively.
2.3. Analysis
Regarding responses to the questionnaire on the use of sound during games ((iii) in the questionnaire), multiple ordinal logistic regression (OLR) [5] was employed to examine the significant contribution ratio of each participant attribute, such as years of volleyball experience, position, highest spike touch, height, and whether they listened to music before the game. Then, the log odds ratio of each attribute was calculated to determine the degree of relevance of the responses. Afterward, the effect of the factors was discussed based on the presence or absence of significant differences and magnitude of the log odds ratio. The effect of the factor is greater than other factors when the log odds ratio of a factor was greater than 0, and vice versa.
Next, to discuss the size of each response value, a one-sample t-test was employed to verify the significant difference between the response values and the 3 (Neutral) in the Likert scale. Moreover, to clarify the significant differences among the responses to questionnaire items and to examine the main effects for questionnaire items, analysis of variance (ANOVA) was employed. Aligned rank transform (ART) [6] was conducted on the scales prior to ANOVA because the evaluated scales were non-normally distributed. Then, the
e-mail: miura-t@aist.go.jp
[doi:10.1250/ast.42.146]
146
significance of the main effects was determined using post-hoc multiple comparison methods based on the least square means and Tukey’s multiplicity adjustment [7,8].
3. Results and discussion 3.1. Overview
The left panel in Fig. 1 displays the results of the respondents’ use of sound during games, whereas the right panel of Figs. 1 and 2 show the log odds ratio for the factors of the OLR for each question. The OLR results of the responses to the questions indicated that most of the main effects were significant ( p < 0:05) or tended to be significant ( p < 0:10). In the cases where a significant main effect was
observed, positive log odds ratios were obtained for years of experience and highest spike touch, whereas negative log odds ratios were observed for height, listening to music pre-game, and positions. In terms of the absolute value of the log odds ratios, years of experience was the largest among the attributes with positive values. However, for the negative ones, the effect of position and listening to music before the game was large, whereas the effect of height was relatively small. According to some participants’ comments, listening to music before the game was performed to improve their concentration, but none of them mentioned the effect on auditory function during the game. These results suggest that, in general, the more the years of experience, the more likely they pay attention to the sounds generated during a match regardless of position, height, and whether they listen to music before the game.
Next, according to the left edge part of Fig. 1, regarding significant differences between responses to the questions and neutral value (¼ 3), except for responses to Q2.1 and Q2.3 (voices), Q3.3 (direction of teammate’s serve), Q4.7 (azimuth of opponent’s receptions), and Q6.8 (distance of opponent’s digs), significant differences or marginal signifi-cance was observed ( p < 0:10) in all responses. Furthermore, significant trends were noted for Q6.6 and Q6.7 (elevation and azimuth of opponent’s digs; p < 0:10). Many items with significant difference included those where the participants paid careful attention, whereas the values for Q7.1–7.5 (shoe sounds) were significantly lower. These results indicated that volleyball players pay more attention to sounds, such as voices and ball-related sounds. In addition, they scarcely noticed shoe sounds during games and thus did not utilize them for estimating the players’ condition.
Furthermore, according to the significant differences between responses to the questions displayed in the left panel of Fig. 1, Q2.2 (teammates’ voice) and Q4.1 (teammates’ receptions) were rated significantly higher than the majority of other items. Q2.2 and Q4.1 showed a significant main effect and larger odds ratios in terms of years of experience. The participants’ comments indicated that they perceived a poor reception for dull sounds and a good reception for high pitched or low volumed sounds. Although understanding that volleyball players are particularly concerned about their teammates’ voice is easy on the basis of other examples, they specifically take advantage of auditory information to predict whether the reception of the teammates is good or bad, which is an interesting observation.
3.2. Referee’s whistle and voice
The sound of the referee’s whistle (Q1) were reported to significantly more attention than voices from opposing players (Q2.3) while the voices of the teammates (Q2.2) attracted significantly more attention than voices from the bench (Q2.1) and opposing players (Q2.3) ( p < 0:05) (left panel in Fig. 1). The results of the log odds ratio (right panel in Fig. 1) indicate that players with more years of experience pay more attention to the voices of their allies, whereas the voice of the teammate was the most used auditory information among all the items. This finding indicates that attention to the teammate’s voice is especially important for the functioning of the combination during matches.
Table 1 Questions on the use of sound during games.
Table 2 Positions experienced by participants.
Position # Position #
Wing Spiker (WS) 45 Setter (S) 12
Middle Blocker (MB) 21 Libero (L) 14
T. MIURA et al.: ACOUSTIC CUES IN PLAYING VOLLEYBALL
3.3. Serves
A comparison between teammates’ and opponents’ serves revealed that auditory information was used significantly more frequently in predicting the opponent’s serve (Q3.4–3.6) in general (left panel in Fig. 1). In this case, the log odds ratio for height was significantly higher than 0 in estimating the speed of opponent’s serve (Q3.4). The reason for this result may be because taller players tend to participate in attacks after reception, which requires them to make quick decisions. In addition, they would tend to slowly decide overhand/under-hand receptions compared with other players, such that they may employ auditory information to make quick decisions. 3.4. Receptions
Excluding the responses to Q4.7 (azimuth of opponent’s reception), the participants generally and significantly used auditory information to estimate the characteristics of team-mates’ and opponents’ receptions (Q4.1–4.6, 4.8). A signifi-cant difference was observed only between the responses to Q4.1 (estimation of teammate’s receptions as good or bad) and Q4.7 ( p < 0:05). A significant and large log odds ratio was noted for the factor years of experience regarding the use of auditory information in estimating the teammate’s recep-tion (right panel in Fig. 1). Therefore, the more the years of experience, the more likely players make use of sound information for estimating the preferences of receptions.
Conversely, the log odds ratio for height and highest spike touch (right panel in Fig. 1) tended to be significant or
5-point Likert Scale
Set of significance (p < 0.05) Existence of a significant effect p < 0.05 p < 0.10 p > 0.10 Reference Significant pair Existence ofx Existence of a significant effects n a significant effect p < 0.05 p < 0.10 p < 0 10 p > 0.10 Referencee Significant pairn Q7.5 Q7.4 Q7.3 Q7.2 Q7.1 Q6.8 Q6.7 Q6.6 Q6.5 Q6.4 Q6.3 Q6.2 Q6.1 Q5.9 Q5.8 Q5.7 Q5.6 Q5.5 Q5.4 Q5.3 Q5.2 Q5.1 Q4.8 Q4.7 Q4.6 Q4.5 Q4.4 Q4.3 Q4.2 Q4.1 Q3.6 Q3.5 Q3.4 Q3.3 Q3.2 Q3.1 Q2.3 Q2.2 Q2.1 Q1 1 2 3 4 5 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * + + * * * * * p < .05 p < .10 p > .10
Years of experience Height Highest spike touch Music
-1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 -2 0 2 Q7.5 Q7.4 Q7.3 Q7.2 Q7.1 Q6.8 Q6.7 Q6.6 Q6.5 Q6.4 Q6.3 Q6.2 Q6.1 Q5.9 Q5.8 Q5.7 Q5.6 Q5.5 Q5.4 Q5.3 Q5.2 Q5.1 Q4.8 Q4.7 Q4.6 Q4.5 Q4.4 Q4.3 Q4.2 Q4.1 Q3.6 Q3.5 Q3.4 Q3.3 Q3.2 Q3.1 Q2.3 Q2.2 Q2.1 Q1
Log odds ratio (error bars represent 95% confidence intervals (CIs)).
Fig. 1 (Left) The use of sounds generated during volleyball games. The items with green asterisks () and crosses (+) are
the questions whose responses were significant ( p < 0:05) and marginally significant ( p < 0:10) to the neutral value (¼ 3), respectively. The items in which significant and marginally significant partial regression coefficients were found are illustrated by boxes in dark and pale blue, respectively. The right panel of the graph indicates the sets of significant difference. We displayed the significantly different combinations that indicated by a red rectangle and black asterisk marks: the rectangle is the source while the asterisks are the comparison. (Right) Log odds ratios on the following factors: years of experience, height, highest spike touch, and listening to music before the game.
S MB WS L -2 0 2 -2 0 2 -2 0 2 -2 0 2 Q7.5 Q7.4 Q7.3 Q7.2 Q7.1 Q6.8 Q6.7 Q6.6 Q6.5 Q6.4 Q6.3 Q6.2 Q6.1 Q5.9 Q5.8 Q5.7 Q5.6 Q5.5 Q5.4 Q5.3 Q5.2 Q5.1 Q4.8 Q4.7 Q4.6 Q4.5 Q4.4 Q4.3 Q4.2 Q4.1 Q3.6 Q3.5 Q3.4 Q3.3 Q3.2 Q3.1 Q2.3 Q2.2 Q2.1 Q1
Log odds ratio (error bars represent 95% confidence intervals (CIs)).
Fig. 2 Log odds ratios of the following factors:
posi-tions, such as setter (S), main blocker (MB), wing spiker (WS), and libero (L). The colors of the points and error bars refer to the legend at the right panel of Fig. 1.
Acoust. Sci. & Tech. 42, 3 (2021)
marginally significant in predicting opponent’s receptions. The reason underlying this fact may be because players with higher highest spike touch are more conscious of stopping with a block, and, therefore, make use of auditory information to decide their position after the opponent’s receptions. The log odd ratios for positions (Fig. 2) were all significant and less than 0 in predicting opponent’s receptions. This result indicated that other factors are significantly more important than positional information. Thus, investigating the detailed use of auditory information is necessary by observing players and by implementing auditory interventions during actual volleyball matches.
3.5. Estimating ball preferences near the net
All combinations among the responses for Q5.1–5.9 were non-significantly different ( p > 0:10), and the responses to these items were significantly greater than 3.0 ( p < 0:01). This result suggests that auditory information may be significantly used to predict the ball’s behavior when playing near the net. The authors initially predicted that auditory information would be used in cases where seeing the opponents between blocks of teammates is difficult. However, the results implied that auditory information was actively used in all cases for Q5.4–5.9, whereas no significant difference was observed. Such a difference should be investigated by observing the actual behavior of players during games.
As depicted in the right panel of Fig. 1, the log odds ratios were significantly higher than 0 for years of experience (Q5.2–5.3) and significantly or marginally significantly higher than 0 for height and highest spike touch from the opponent’s attack (Q5.6 and Q5.9). This result indicated that the more the years of experience, the more likely they are to use auditory information to predict the attack and next action of the opponents. In addition, the players would use auditory information to grasp the game situation because of difficulty in obtaining visual information other than their front given that players with the highest spike touch are typically positioned at the front to guard the net.
3.6. Digs
Excluding the responses to Q6.8 (distance of opponent’s digs), the participants generally and significantly used auditory information to estimate the characteristics of team-mate’s and opponent’s digs (Q6.1–6.7) ( p < 0:05). All combinations among the responses for Q6.1–6.8 were non-significantly different ( p > 0:10). A significant and large log odds ratio was observed on the factor years of experience regarding the use of auditory information in estimating the teammate’s digs (right panel in Fig. 1). Thus, the more the years of experience, the more likely players make use of sound information for estimating the preferences of team-mate’s digs.
However, no significant log odds ratio on opponent’s digs was noted for experience, height, and highest spike touch (right panel in Fig. 1) ( p > 0:05). In Q6.7 (direction of opponent’s digs), the log odds ratio was greater than 0 with a significant trend noted only for height. This result may suggest that taller players are aware of their blocks and may also use auditory information to determine their block position based on the direction of the opponent’s digs. A
detailed situation should be investigated by observing actual matches and conducting matches with auditory intervention as previously mentioned before.
4. Conclusion and future work
Volleyball players mainly use auditory information to understand various game situations as well as to recognize the voices of teammates. Notably, players with longer experience make use of auditory information in defensive situations, for predicting the ball behaviors of teammate’s receptions, and digs. The reason underlying these notions is that players with more experience tend to be more conscious of making the first play with higher accuracy to connect to the next attack of their team. Alternatively, a slight difference was observed in the use of auditory information through years of experience when playing over the net. In this case, the role of other players, such as blockers, may have influenced this fact.
In the future, the study intends to further clarify these findings in detail through observation of actual matches and intervention experiments. Then, it aims to discuss how to improve the competitiveness of volleyball based on auditory information. In addition, the study will investigate the use of auditory information in other games and systematize a method for improving athletic performance using not only physical ability but also sensory function.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 18K18625. The authors would like to thank the members of the KAIT volleyball club for their efforts and cooperation. The authors would like to thank Enago (www. enago.jp) for the English language review.
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T. MIURA et al.: ACOUSTIC CUES IN PLAYING VOLLEYBALL
