Working Memory and Climbing
Latest research into cognitive processes and climbing ability: working memory
Consider a climber on the wall in a climbing gym, as they climb they are interacting with a lot of stimuli all around them: the climbing holds, their own body position, the sensation of height, the music and voices of other climbers. All of this input could be processed by the brain, but that is a lot of effort.
Our attention selects what information goes to the centre (think of this as the control room) which then sends it to different places to be processed. Some of that information might be committed to long term memory (e.g. a memory of how the holds look and feel), some of it may be directed to the task at hand (e.g. the hold is slopey, I need to tighten my grip). All of this is unconscious, though it can become conscious depending on how it is processed by the brain.
It follows that our ability to process all of this information instantaneously, as we climb, would be helpful for our performance in the moment (as well as in the future). However, the research so far on working memory and how this relates to climbing performance specifically is curious.
Garrido-Palomino et al (2024) investigated the relationship between working memory and climbing ability, taking into account sex, age, education level and climbing experience.
When controlling for these factors, they observed a significant negative association between working memory capacity and on-sight climbing ability. This means that those participants with a larger working memory capacity, had a lower self reported on-sight ability. The more highly skilled climbers had a smaller working memory capacity.
What does this mean?
What our brains are doing is just as important for climbing ability as what our bodies are doing.
But, just because you have a large working memory capacity, does not mean you are processing the ‘right’ information. It just means you’re processing a lot of information. For example, Garrido et al suggest that higher working memory capacity may lead to increased focus on dangerous and emotional stimuli that may be unhelpful for climbing performance.
If we think of attention as a filter, having strong attentional skills means you only select the most useful information to go through to the control room for processing. This means less effort for your brain in total. If your filter lets lots of information through, your working memory has a bigger job to do.
Garrido et al suggest that a smaller working memory capacity may be a strength gained from better attentional control and long term memory learned from repeated practice.
What does this mean for climbers?
More research is needed to understand these relationships but attention training, especially for more novice or below expert climbers could be really beneficial. For example, memorising routes and sequences and training ability to focus on the most helpful information through repeated practice.
That’s why our performance plans include a measure that accounts for attentional control as well as several other psychological skills. We use our knowledge of sport psychology applied practice and research to train psychological skills in climbers to improve performance. If you want to know more about our performance plans and psychological assessment, or climbing and psychological coaching for climbing, get in touch.
References
Baddeley AD, Hitch GJ. (1974). Working memory. In The Psychology of Learning and Motivation: Advances in Research and Theory, ed. GA Bower, pp. 47–89. New York: Academic
Garrido-Palomino. I., Giles, D., Fryer, S.,González-Montesinos, J. L., and, España-Romero, V. (2024) Cognitive function of climbers: an exploratory study of working memory and climbing performance, The Spanish Journal of Psychology [online] 27, e24, pp. 1–10. Accessed 02/10/2024.
