Effects of relative frequency and delay interval of knowledge of results (KR) in the acquisition of motor skills

The purpose of the present study was to identify the effects of relative frequency and delay interval of Knowledge of Results (KR) in the acquisition of a serial motor skill. Sixty students were randomly distributed in 2 experiments, with three groups in each experiment (n = 10). The Experiment 1 investigated the effects of the KR frequency without KR delay interval and the Experiment 2 investigated the effects of the KR frequency with KR delay interval (3 seconds) in the acquisition of a serial motor skill. The serial task consisted of putting a tennis ball into six holes, positioned in a wood platform in a previously determined target time. In both experiments, the subjects performed 60 trials in target time of 2,700 ms, in the acquisition phase. In the Experiment 1, the results showed superiority of G33 in relation to the other groups, during the tests. In the Experiment 2, the results did not show any difference among the groups. These results are discussed with respect to the effect of KR delay interval, showing the role of combination of the variables.