Surrey Downs GC in the United Kingdom found that erecting signs on greens that read, “Did you leave a pitchmark? Don’t leave it—repair it!” along with an image of a pair of eyes resulted in the number of divots dropping by 51 percent.
A bizarre study carried out at Surrey Downs Golf Club in the United Kingdom has found that signs containing eyes are more likely to get golfers to repair their divots, the London-based Golf Club Management reported.
Sport Psychology (SPL) partnered with Wimbledon Signs to erect a sign by a green that suffered from unrepaired divots. The sign said, above two eyes: “Did you leave a pitchmark?” and below the eyes stated: “Don’t leave it—repair it!” (Click here to view the sign.)
SPL then compared the results over two greens that both suffered an almost identical number of unrepaired divots. It found that with no sign, the number of divots increased by 27 percent, but with the sign they dropped by 51 percent, Management reported.
“The signs work by triggering deep rooted circuits in the brain that were vital in the survival of our ancestors and still work today even though we now live in a modern 21st century society,” said an SPL spokesman. “These circuits are hardwired into the emotional parts of the human brain and drive our automatic behaviors. The more advanced thinking brain notes the impact the sign is having on our emotions and ensures that it then attends to the written message, when it could easily turn our attention mechanisms elsewhere when the a traditional sign only has words.”
A survey in 2013 found that more than nine in ten greenskeepers believe that golfers should pass a test on course care before they are allowed to play the game. Ninety-one percent of members of the British and International Greenskeepers Association said they would like golfers to pass a test on etiquette and course care before they play, as is the case in some European countries, because some golfers leave the course in an inappropriate state, Management reported.
More than half of greenskeepers, 57 percent, said golfers are bad or very bad at repairing divots, although the majority of golfers, 71 percent, are not bad or very bad at putting divots back, Management reported.
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