Freediving Physiology/Psychology Research Opportunity

[rvale1]

I'm a 4th yr Adventure Education student at the University of Chichester currently working on my dissertation proposal. I am hugely interested in extreme environmental physiology, in particular the human dive reflex, the physiological mechanisms involved in free diving andpotentially the psychology of free diving.

Basically i am interested in firstly: contact details for any clubs or individuals in the sussex area and secondly whether you or your club have any research interests in a particular area of the sport, or if currently there are any questions regarding training, physiology or psychology within the sport that you are currently looking to investigate further... I am looking to complete my dissertation on something relating to free diving but am very open as to the subject, i appreciate that if the subjects and researchers have an invested intrest in the study, commitment and benefits are greatly increased of/for all, plus i am woud like my findings to be directly applicable to the sport, a certain club, or even a certain individual.

I'm really keen to talk to any who is interested or who can possibly shed some light as a starting point and hopefully move on and get the ball rolling from there...

I very much look forward to hearing from you and am excited about what opportunities a collaboration with you or your club could hold. (as the deadline for my dissertation proposal is fast approaching i would very much appreciate a quick response from anybody interested!).

Thank you for your time,

Regards,

Becki Vale

 

[cebaztian]

Hi

What have you studied in this adventure education.
Biology? Psychology?
What resources do you have to throw in to this dissertation?
Biology studies would requre some machines.

What psychology apsects would you be intrested in?

Directly applicable sounds good

Could you solve squeeze please. How to effectlively prevent it.
Could you solve motivational problems?
Could you tell us if repeated blackouts give any longterm damage?
Any easy way to get rid of performance anxiety?
Could you give as a scheme on what to train (in what proportions) if you only had 100 hours to train, or 300, or 500?
Does CO2 levels affect Dive response?
How much does cardio fitness relate to oxygen cosnumption during apnea?

The first things in my mind

Sebastian

 

[rvale1]

Hi Sebastian! thanks for the quick response!

As part of the course we have covered (amongst other things) sport physiology, sport psych, adventure psych and the physiology of extreme environments. I worked at a Military research institute with the royal marines for 6 months as a scientific research officier and ran a study with them looking at the energy expenditure of hiking. I conducted a basic research study on the human dive reflex in my second year and am now looking to further my knowledge, but also research in the area. Our university has a fairly sound set of portable physiological testing equipment, and should testing be held on site, even more would be available. That said, in close proximity to our uni there is a Submarine evacuation testing tank currently booked out weekly by a local freediving club that allows decents up to 30m which could potential be used for testing depending on what topic i take on... which is an exciting prospect!

The physiological aspects of the sport are my predominant interest but combining this with psychology would also be possible... One possible topic is looking at cortisol (stress) levels amongst trained free divers and non-freediving populations, resting and during immersion and the relationship between cortisol levels and depth or duration of immersion - whether this has been done or not is still to be explored fully..

Your query regarding CO2 levels and their potential effects of the dive reflex are intriguing... i will look in to that one further...

Im guessing you arent based in the UK are you?

Do you have any contacts in the UK that you think may be interested in this research opportunity? and clubs? individuals? organisations?

Thanks again for your input, i look forward to hearing from you

Becki

 

[agbiv]

Welcome from Texas! Good luck in your venture. There are lots of UK based spearos & divers on DB. Just look for some posts and PM them.

 

[apneaboy]

You also contacted the bfa, I am currently looking after the clubs role. There is a clubs list on the bfa site and where they train is listed with e-mails etc. In particular deeperblue do courses at the sett so maybe contact stephan whelan direct (he is papa smurf on here) and marcus of no-tanx goes there sometimes too.

My recomendation would be to pick a subject quickly to see if you can generate specific interest rather than general. We are running into winter so you will probably need to consider something dry or pool based. Not much stress attached to diving the sett though for advanced psychology I would not consider this a jumping out of a plane sport, maybe sway towards physical responses and there is a massive amount of literature to source from, always useful in a final dis.

Trux here on deeperblue has a database of resources, very good. Pm me here if you want any specific advice once you get a bit further involved and decide if freediving is the way forward for your dis for sure.
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[efattah]

The greatest unsolved problem in freediving physiology is that related to myoglobin.

There is indirect evidence that some of the greatest freedivers (particularly those who spearfish 6h+ per day for years), have highly elevated myoglobin levels. However, no one has had the money or time to actually do the biopsies to measure that.

An incredibly useful study would measure the myoglobin in a large cross section of freedivers:
- Professional spearfishermen
- Record (deep) divers
- Average free divers

Each subject should be asked about his/her training methods. These would then be correlated with the myoglobin result for each individual.

A follow up study could study the desaturation curve of the myoglobin during dives of various types, much like has been done on seals.

The results of the study would provoke international astoundment, as I'm quite sure if you measure the right individuals, the results will show myoglobin levels FAR beyond anything that has ever been measured in humans before. The study would conclusively prove that myoglobin can be dramatically elevated through training/acclimatization.

And one of the great debates in the sport would come to an end.

Just make sure you measure the right people!

 

[wes]

Eric,

Maybe you should make this suggestion to the researchers doing studies now like the one doing the seal study in California. I have e-mailed direct to scientists half a dozen different times with my "whacky" theories and they have always responded very positively and thanked me for the thoughts. I think sometimes researchers think and worry that "normal" people don't think or care or understand what the point of their research is and usually are really excited that some one is interested, especially a non-scientist. Hope all is well - Cheers Wes

 

[Salehthefish]

Hello and welcome on DB
all best in ur research

 

[cebaztian]

Would this question be more important.

Does repeated hypoxi/LMCBO cause long term damage?

Sebastian

 

[apneaboy]

Yes, for my dissertation I cabbaged 12 freedivers rofl
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[efattah]

Would this question be more important.

Does repeated hypoxi/LMCBO cause long term damage?

Sebastian

From experiments on myself I would say 'yes for sure', but you would never manage to do this experiment on other people. At least not legally. The only way would be to experiment on yourself, because no ethics committee would ever allow a random person to be forcefully subjected to dozens of blackouts.

 

[Kars]

Well government seem not to have problems with legalese they just put you in a new legal category, terrorist, enemy combatant, et voila legal problem solved

I like Eric's search proposal.

I think history already provides us with some hints, for and insurance companies and governing bodies and relatives it can be reassuring to know that a BO or LMC is no more harmful than say football, or running. I worry about that science is often elevated to a holy level and can be bought and used against people. I would not like to see a law or policies prohibiting freediving in my local pool or lake, at any place. So in all fairness I would opt for Eric's idea.

Let us know what you've chosen and how your research is going, what finding you had etc, we're all ears!

Love, Courage and Water,

Kars

 

[williew]

hi becki
i too am in chichester 4th yr adventure education and facilitation, but i am distance.i am also a spearfisherman. i thought of something similar for my dissertation but we dont have any facilities, or enough freedivers here in ireland. i will be very keen to see how you get on, hope it works out well for you. did you put a post in the sussex forum? go to europe then uk and ireland then sussex, i am sure you will find some local contacts there
willie