Ruud Den Hartigh
« The development of excellent performance in sport: A dynamic network approach »
Across different sports, athletes develop their talent in various ways. This means that the trajectories to the top look differently between athletes (e.g., gradual increase, S-shaped, step-wise, etc.). The underlying components that shape the athletes’ talent development trajectories (e.g., training, genetic endowment, psychological and physical factors, etc.) are also undergoing change in individual-specific ways. Any model of sports talent should thus account for these developmental properties. In this talk, I will demonstrate how simulations of dynamic models can be used to uncover the theoretical foundation underlying talent development.