ORCID
Nicholas David Bowman: 0000-0001-5594-9713 | Aaron R. Seitz: 0000-0003-4936-9303 | C. Shawn Green: 0000-0002-9290-0262
Document Type
Article
Date
2025
Keywords
esports, perception, cognitive abilities, motor abilities, individual differences
Language
english
Disciplines
Film and Media Studies
Description/Abstract
Historically, there has been a great deal of interest in using basicmeasures of individual difference factors to predict future success in traditional sports. For instance, the National Football League (NFL) holds a scouting combine each year prior to the NFL draft during which a host of attributes about players are measured, from basic height and weight, to sprint speed, to jumping capacity, to strength. Even among an already highly selected group of individuals (i.e., individuals skilled enough to even be considered for the NFL), such measures have been seen to have some degree of utility in predicting future performance. The rise of esports has resulted in interest in the potential for batteries of measures that could be similarly predictive of future esports success. Early research suggests that this might indeed be possible. Indeed, work in this sphere has already demonstrated associations between a range of basic abilities and esports aptitude. Perhaps not surprisingly, given the differential nature of esports compared to traditional sports, the most predictive abilities are largely those related to basic perceptual, cognitive, and motor performance (e.g., speed of processing, multitasking ability, working memory). In this commentary, we discuss this burgeoning literature and highlight major challenges on the route to creating an “esports combine.”
Recommended Citation
Bowman, N. D., Sweeney, K., Seitz, A. R., & Green, C. S. (2025). Toward a Combine-Style Approach to Predicting Future Esports Success. Technology, Mind, and Behavior, 6(2). https://doi.org/10.1037/tmb0000165
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
