Google Glass May Help Athletes Perform Better in Long Distance Races

It turns out that athletes that are exposed to subliminal visual cues during endurance exercise may perform significantly better than those who aren't. Scientists have discovered that these cues prime an athlete's body to continue to work.

Subliminal visual cues are words, pictures or symbols which are unidentifiable in someone's conscious. While they're unidentifiable consciously, though, it seems as if they permeate the subconscious.

In this case, the researchers placed words and faces in front of a digital screen in front of an athlete for less than .02 seconds. The athlete was conducting an endurance exercise at the time, and the cues included positive subliminal cues such as "go" and "energy." The cues also included happy faces.

It turns out that the subliminal visual cues could directly affect performance during exercise. Not only that, but it confirmed that the perception of how much effort someone thinks they are using can be altered during exercise. This, in turn, can have a knock-on effect on their overall endurance capacity.

In the future, it may actually be possible to affect a person's ability to continue in an endurance-related exercise by using "smart glasses," such as Google Glass. By providing positive subliminal cues, it's potentially possible to encourage a person to exercise more.

The findings are published in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.

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