BIOMECHANICAL ANALYSIS OF BADMINTON SERVES USING STANDARD AND BODY SCALED EQUIPMENT: A PERCEITION-ACTION PERSPECTIVE

INTRODUCTION It is not unusual for a child to begin playing tennis with a discarded adult racquet, or for a pee wee basketball league to be played on a court with regulation goals and balls. Many children do not have the strength or size needed to manipulate these adult objects in an efficient manner. Using the perception-action perspective of motor development, scaling environmental objects such as racquets, nets, balls, bats, goals, stairs, etc. to body sue would allow for movements that were previously impossible (Haywood, 1993).The perception-action perspective is based on the model proposed by the writings of J.J. Gibson (1979). A concept central to Gibson s writings is that of affordance. Affordance is all the possibilities or opportunities the environment allows a given animal to do. PURPOSE AND PROCEDURES The purpose of this study was to conduct a quantifiable biomechanical analysis of children s serving patterns using standard badminton equipment and equipment scaled for body size. This was compared to the serving pattern of an elite badminton player. The subjects for the study were children (N=10) ages 5 to 9 and an elite, previously ranked, badminton player. Each child was f h e d performing 10 trials under two conditions for a total of 20 trials. In Condition A, the child performed 10 serves with a modified racquet over a modified net height (scaled for body size). In Condition B, each child performed 10 serves with a standard racquet over a standard net height. The elite badminton player was filmed performing 10 serves with his racquet. The film was digitized and analyzed using a movement analysis system. The horizontal and vertical linear displacements and velocities of the center of gravity and the angular displacements and velocities of the shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees, and ankles were compared with results of the elite performer. Additionally, each child s performance using the modified equipment were compared to that using the standard equipment. CONCLUSION The results of the study supported the perception-action perspective of affordance. REFERENCES Gibson, J. J. (1979). An ecological approach to visual perception. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.. Haywood, K. M. (1993). Life span motor development (2nd 4.). Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics Publishers