Investigating the Role of Ipsilateral and Contralateral Eye-Hand Dominance in Tennis Serve Accuracy of Amateur Tennis Players

IntroductionTennis serve has been developed in recent times, thus serving speed has been significantly increased. In Rolland Garros for example, from 2002 to 2009 the mean difference in average serving speed has been reported to increase from 165,1 to 188,9 km/h, the percentage of first serve accuracy from 60,2% to 64,2% and aces from 2.2 to 8,6 (Pollard, Pollard, Barnett u0026 Zeleznikow, 2009; Born, 2011). Considering that in this period there was no change in athletes body characteristics, we may support the hypothesis that serve speed is independent of body strength or advantages due to body characteristic, although depends on improved tennis serve technique, as has been mentioned in recent studies (Pugh, Kovaleski, Heitman, u0026 Gilley, 2003; Reid, Elliott u0026 Alderson, 2007; Reid, Whiteside, u0026 Elliott, 2011). Another research examined the contribution of muscle activation of selected muscle groups involved in tennis serve. They concluded that, elasticity of muscles of the dominant hand, such as wrist flexors , plays a significant role in accuracy and serve speed (P Coordination seems to be the main factor affecting tennis serve performance (Schoenborn, 1998; Durovic, Lozovina u0026 Mrduljas, 2008; Reid, Whiteside, u0026 Elliott, 2011). Muscle synergy and coordination depends on the side of the serving court. A recent study (Wend, Ehstand u0026 Prechtl, 2010), found that a training program aiming to improve serve speed, shown better results when athletes performed serve from the right side (5,49 km / h) than the left side ( 4,81 km / h). Lower limps technique also, during the serve, i.e if the player holds behind the right foot (right-handed) (foot-back technique) or moves it next to the left (foot-up technique) seemed to affect the service speed. The foot up technique accomplishes higher speeds on the vertical axis (larger vertical forces) according to the study of Elliott and Wood (Elliott, u0026 Wood, 1983).Visual contact with the ball when tossing the ball during serve is a basic prerequisite of expertise technique (Knudson, Luedtke, u0026 Faribault, 1994; Brown, 2004). A critical detail at this point, is playeru0027s eye dominance when tossing the ball with the non-dominant hand and just before the contact between the ball and the head of the racquet.Hand dominance, as a laterality index, represents structural and functional asymmetries of brain hemispheres. Their contribution to phylogenic and ontogenetic development of human, have been well documented by neuroscientific data. Since the second half of the twentieth century, researchers and sport psychologists, were concerned with the contribution of hand and eye preference to aiming skills. To the best of our knowledge, despite a few researches who mentioned eye movements when tossing the ball (Knudson et al., 1994) and the eye hand coordination while hitting the ball (Sahan, u0026 Erman, 2009), there are no studies investigating eye hand dominance in tennis. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of ipsilateral and contralateral eye hand dominance in tennis serve accuracy. Additionally, the aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that players with ipsilateral and contralateral eye hand dominance do not differ significantly in tennis serve accuracy.Materials and MethodsParticipants: 41 right handed amateur level tennis players participated in this study, 22 male and 19 female (table1). The average age was 20.9 (S.D.= ± 0,66). The training years in tennis were between 1 and 3 years.Procedure - tools - measures: Eye and hand dominance were evaluated using the self-reported questionnaire Lateral Preference Inventory of Coren (Coren, 1993) and by the use of two tests, which gave the same results. According to ipsilateral or contralateral eye-hand preference model, the sample was divided into two groups: the ipsilateral eye-hand dominance group and the contralateral eye-hand dominance group. …