Basketball players stimming with mouthguards?

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It sure looks that way. This weekend I watched some men's college basketball---and the women's final of Baylor vs. Notre Dame is tonight! [Tuesday] ---and often during a time out, I would see a player use his mouth and/or tongue to take the mouthguard partially out of his mouth, hold it in a certain position, sometimes chew on it a little, sometimes just hold it, and then use his mouth and tongue to put it back into place. It seemed like it was something to focus his attention on.

Another example, I watched Ivan Lendl and Mats Wilander play in the French Open final way back around 1988. They would have these long intense rallies. And then one or both would stare at their racquet as they adjusted strings. I don't think they really needed to adjust the strings that much. Rather, I think this close in focus kind of allowed them to center themselves in preparation for the next point.

As a third example, poker players often fiddle with their chips.

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And so, stimming is relatively 'normal'! (and no such thing as 'normal' anyway ) We on the spectrum might stim more often, and that's okay. We might stim in different ways and that's okay, too. And sure, stimming has its time and place aspects.

Last edited by AardvarkGoodSwimmer on 06 Apr 2012, 9:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Well I will answer the poker one:-

Most poker players do it to keep their hands busy so not to give off any tells during play. If a player gets real nervous during play you will usually see his hand shake or twitch. to solve this some continously play with their chips to avoid it.

But do some also do it to maintain a higher than average level of concentration?

I have played a little poker myself (broke even, please be careful people). These days I just play league poker for points. It's like a bowling league.

I also saw a pretty good player in my league make an all-in move late in a tournament and then rock.

I can not speak for everyone. But its to divert your opponents attention to the playing with chips. He could have a good hand or a bad hand. It's to divert you away from any other signals, as you end up focusing on them playing with they chips.

Some might do it, as they like the sound & they think it might annoy the other player or for concentration or they bored waiting for the next move. But then in the end if they using it for thinking or bored, then it also could be a sign of a good or bad hand. Staying neutral & giving nothing, would be a good poker player.

You would have to interview poker players & that's if they would tell you why they do it, for real.

Other examples:

4) During the NFL combine, a coach was giving instructions for a pass receiving drill and several of the players were bouncing up and down as they seemed to be intently listening. Yes, some of it is staying physically loose. But it sure seemed like they were using this physical motion as a way to maintain concentration to something they had probably heard before. My guess is that they have heard the instructions before but they want to review it in their minds one more time, for this is a game similar to football, but not football itself. And doing well in the Combine is draft position and, quite possibly, literally millions of dollars. (And of course, if these players were younger and doing this in a public "school" setting, they would be labelled ADHD!)

5) The singer Chrissie Hynde of The Pretenders was sitting in a chair playing guitar and singing. Toward the beginning of the song, during a transition from one part of the song to another, she rocked twice as if she was using that physical movement to get into it.

6) Just this Wednesday, during my once-a-week history class, about an hour and fifteen minutes into the lecture with potentially another hour to go (yes, really!), I saw this woman in front of me begin to bounce her knee as if she was using this physical motion in order to maintain concentration.

I want to expand what's considered 'normal.'