INFLUENCES OF GENDER ON ATTENTION AND LEARNING OF MOTOR SKILLS

Seventy-four children (38 girls and 36 boys) with a mean age of 8,03 years participated in the study. The task involved participants to ride a Pedalo, without support.

The participants were divided in six groups, three for each sex, in relation to the instruction: Proximal External Focus (FP); Distal External Focus (FD); Control (C). The results showed that, in acquisition phase, boys outperformed girls (p=0,022). In transfers tests, only T2 showed a significant difference (p=0,014), with better performance of boys and, for the focus of attention, the distant external focus was higher than the control group in both transfers tests (p=0,034; p=0,018).