That's actually working technique in sports psychology – one version of it called VSM (Video Self-Modelling), where edited video shows athlete performing correct/advanced technique. It tricks brain to belive in "future self". I'm not surprised it works with photos that well, but I think it's not studied yet. These AI photos I make a very different from, say, photoshopped faced. I tried it on myself too, and can confirm that it does have psychological effect.

Anything has an "psychological effect," and tricking a person into thinking any old junk is "better than therapy" is trivial - look at all the people who spend time and money on AI chatbots. It's also pretty clear it's not actually _good for them_.

And there's zero surprise here it would be used to manipulate potential athletes.

When I was in grade school I got the whole pitch on visualization: picture yourself making the free throw and you're more likely to make the free throw.

Again, this stuff didn't start with AI.

Fascinating!

Portraiture has always, always, always idealized its subjects, long before photography was a thing.