Hello:
It seems to me that a couple of important concepts have been overlooked. In my experience, the movement of price often reflects the urgency (speed) with which buyers or sellers enter orders. This urgency to enter is why an order to buy shares executes at the offer, rather than at the bid. Conversely , urgency to exit is reflected in orders to sell that execute at the bid, rather than at the offer. Because there are a variety of participants in the market, with similar agendas, there is an aspect of "mob mentality" that is often seen when economic reports, earnings reports, or news items are released. Even in the execution of programs, one can see the effect that many orders executing electronically has on price. Professionals call these movements "spikes" and (eventually) learn to trade them in countertrend fashion. By the way, a good example of how important "urgency" is can be seen in the Late Day Reversal. Once again, if you simply review intraday charts, one can see periodically, a situation where groups of participants change their minds late in the day. The market reverses, picks up momentum as participants struggle to execute, initially on one side of the spread, then as time starts to run out, with "market orders" as they rush to get "to the door" before it closes.
Support and resistance are important concepts certainly. But again I believe that many are overlooking the obvious. Wide Range Bars, and Gaps. If you simply review daily charts with an eye towards finding these two elements, what you notice eventually is that price often hesitates and retraces, at about the mid-point of a wide range bar. Gaps often serve the same function, and finally Swing Points. I find that all three are important in helping the trader to identify areas that traders call "support and resistance. Southpaw46