Biological maturity and choice reaction time in Japanese adolescent soccer players

In this study, the effect of biological maturity in developments of central information processing (CIP) evaluated from choice reaction time (CRT) was investigated from cross-sectional and longitudinal studies. The subjects were Japanese adolescent soccer players. Biological maturity was evaluated according to skeletal age. CRT was measured using the Talent-Diagnose-System. In the cross-sectional study, skeletal age correlated with CRT (r = -0.52, p < 0.01), and there were some differences in developmental aspects of CRT between chronological age and skeletal age. In the longitudinal study, CRT improved significantly from 10 to 11 years of chronological age. During this period, development of skeletal age exceeded chronological maturation. Moreover, the annual improvement of CRT correlated with that of skeletal age (r=-0.45, p < 0.01). Our results suggest that while we have to consider the effect of external input, such as experience and training, development of CIP was influenced by development of biological maturity in Japanese adolescent soccer players.