This is right back on topic. Let’s say we are studying the gaze behaviours of two different casters. One is a very highly skilled accuracy caster and the other is still at the stage of concentrating on controlling his loops. This second caster, one would expect, would require their attention focused on cues to form tight loops. The more advanced caster doesn’t need these cues and instead can spend his time focussed say just on the target.I think apart from absolute novices, most students have goals that are unobtainable in the short term because they overrate their own skill level and I include myself in that classification. In practice, some might look at the loop but not know what it is they are looking for, others will not specifically look at anything without a target, others will try and track the fly leg but can't keep up because of the additional cognitive load (that was me as well).
The result of that test would on the surface tell us that more time spent looking at the target (caster 1) results in a higher degree of accuracy because this is how the elite caster performs. However if caster 2 was to follow this advice, then in all probability their performance would suffer because it interferes with their ability to cast consistent loops.
Not to say it’s not a valid test but it also needs unpacking and following up.
Cheers, Paul
