Switching focus enhances swimming performance and attentional flexibility in beginner swimmers

Previous studies have shown that directing attention externally can facilitate more fluent and automatic motor control, whereas an internal focus of attention may introduce excessive conscious regulation and impair performance in land-based tasks such as archery, shooting, and golf putting. However, emerging evidence suggests that switching attentional focus may be functionally beneficial for performance in complex motor skills that require continuous coordination of multiple body segments, such as swimming. However, prior research has rarely manipulated switching attentional focus, leaving a critical gap in understanding how dynamic attentional regulation influences motor performance. To address this gap, the present study examined whether a switching focus strategy would lead to superior swimming performance compared to fixed internal or external focus strategies. A total of 20 novice male swimmers (M_age = 11.50 years, SD = 0.76) performed 25-m front-crawl sprints under four conditions: no-instruction control, internal focus, external focus, and switching focus. The results showed a significant condition effect on swimming time, F(3, 57) = 16.20, p < 0.001, ηp2 = 0.460, with the switching-focus condition producing shorter swimming times than both the internal-focus and external-focus conditions; however, no significant difference was observed between the internal-focus and external-focus conditions. In addition, a significant condition effect was found for attentional flexibility, F(3, 57) = 26.10, p < 0.001, ηp2 = 0.579, with the switching-focus condition showing higher attentional flexibility than the control, internal-focus, and external-focus conditions. Both internal-focus and external-focus conditions also demonstrated higher attentional flexibility than the control condition. However, no significant difference in attentional flexibility was observed between the internal- and external-focus conditions. These findings suggest that adopting a switching attentional focus may enhance task-specific perceived attentional flexibility and is associated with improved performance in complex motor skills, highlighting the importance of dynamic attentional regulation in swimming.