Stroboscopic Visual Training in Elite Athletes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

This project is a prospective systematic review and meta-analysis examining the effects of stroboscopic visual training (SVT) on cognitive and perceptual–motor performance in elite athletes. SVT delivers intermittent visual occlusion through liquid-crystal shutter eyewear, forcing athletes to complete perceptual–decision–action sequences under incomplete visual information. Although prior meta-analyses report moderate benefits of SVT in general athlete samples, it remains unresolved whether these gains transfer to elite athletes, whose visual–motor systems are already highly specialized and may approach a functional ceiling. The mechanistic evidence for SVT likewise derives largely from non-elite populations. The review restricts its synthesis to elite athletes, defined by the McKay et al. (2022) framework as Tier 3 (highly trained/national) through Tier 5 (world-class).Its primary aim is to quantify the effect of SVT on two outcome domains — decision-making accuracy (the quality of perceptual–motor output) and reaction time (information-processing speed) — relative to normal-vision training, sham (clear-lens) intervention, active control, or no intervention. A secondary aim is to synthesize the candidate mechanisms by which SVT operates, including acute neural perturbation with neuroplastic adaptation, sensory reweighting with cognitive enhancement, and optimization of motor-control strategies. PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, and CNKI will be searched from inception to 15 September 2026 with no language restriction. Effect sizes will be expressed as Hedges' g and pooled with random-effects models. The expected outcomes are that SVT effects in elite athletes will be smaller or more domain-specific than in mixed-skill samples, and that SVT will improve decision accuracy more reliably than raw reaction time — consistent with the view that occlusion training strengthens anticipatory, feedforward control rather than simple processing speed.