Research in Sport Medicine and Technology

Various studies have shown that the external focus of attention is better than the internal focus of attention. But, so far no study has been investigated the level of electrical activity of the rectus abdominus muscle as a trunk stabilizer muscle. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of focus of attention on electromyography activity of the rectus abdominus muscle during Different phases of vertical jump.Twelve male elite volleyball players from university of Tehran Participated in this research voluntary. They performed a vertical jump on the force plate in both internal and external focus of attention condition. Rectus abdominus Surface electromyography (SEMG) signals recorded by electromyography apparatus during vertical jump and The electrical activity of this muscle was calculated in the different phases of vertical jump motion.  Paired t-test results showed that height of jump under the external focus was higher than the internal focus. In addition, this  results showed that internal focus caused significant increasing in Rectus abdominus EMG in comparison to external focus during concentric phase. But, there was no significant difference in the eccentric phase between the external and internal focus of attention conditions. These results suggest that the external focus of attention effectively increases the efficiency of vertical jump. Therefor; we recommend using the external focus of attention instructions when executing vertical jump movement.