Exercise and Sport Sciences

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Browsing Exercise and Sport Sciences by Author "De Waal, Elna"

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    Establishing norms for kinesthetic coordination tasks in 6-year-olds in the Mangaung, Motheo District
    (University of the Free State, 2021-11) Bonafede, Carmen; De Waal, Elna
    Background: A well-functioning proprioceptive system and overall kinesthetic coordination is foundational to six-year-old children’s movement coordination abilities. The age of six is a crucial time in children’s developmental years, and in South Africa this is the age when they enter the formal school setting. Intact proprioception and kinesthetic coordination are therefore essential for the six-year-old South African. Several intrinsic and extrinsic factors such as gender, hand dominance and socio-economic status (SES) can influence the kinesthetic coordination abilities of six-year-old children. Norms for kinesthetic coordination testing is not available and testing is either inaccessible to everyone and/or very costly from this the main aim of the study was formed. Aims: The first aim of this study is to establish norms for kinesthetic coordination tasks in six-year-old children in the Mangaung, Motheo district and, secondly to establish if kinesthetic coordination differences occur in six-year-olds regarding school quintiles, gender and hand dominance. Setting: The participant group consisted of N=193 six-year-old children of which 97 were boys and 96 were girls, with an average age of 6.46 years (0.27). Participants forming part of this dissertation’s study population were from different quintile schools (one to five) in the Mangaung, Motheo district. Methods: Five kinesthetic coordination tasks (Angels-in-the-snow, Rhomberg, finger-to-nose, shoulder-level-arm raise and force perception) were identified and used to establish norms. Using these norms associated with the five identified kinesthetic coordination tasks differences in school quintiles, gender and hand dominance were studied. Analysis of the study was largely descriptive of nature and norms were calculated using frequencies and percentages. Differences between school quintiles were calculated using the Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel (correlation) chi-square test, and gender and hand dominance differences were calculated using the nonparametric Wilcoxon Two-sample test. Cohens d effect sizes were used to calculate practical significance where applicable. Results: Norms were successfully established for the five kinesthetic coordination tasks. Angels-in-the-snow norms was set at six to ten successful repetitions, Rhomberg norms at 22 – 30 seconds of balance, norms for finger-to-nose for the left and right hand was set at two to three successful repetitions. Norms for shoulder-level-arm-raise for the preferred arm and both arms were set at two to four successful repetitions and for the non-preferred arm at one to four successful repetitions, and lastly for force perception the norm was seen as being able to correctly identify in which hand the heavier weight was placed. Using these norms, it was evident that children in higher SES schools outperformed children in lower SES schools in most of the tasks, except for the Rhomberg task. No significant gender differences in kinesthetic coordination abilities were observed; however, girls mainly outperform boys, with the exception of the shoulder-level-arm-raise task. No practical significance was seen in the Angels-in-the-Snow and Rhomberg tasks regarding gender and preferred arm, although a practical significance was seen for finger-to-nose regarding the left hand and none for gender. For shoulder-level-arm-raise a small practical effect was seen regarding the right hand and again none for gender. No calculations were done for force perception. Conclusions and recommendations: Norms for kinesthetic coordination tasks in six-year-old children were successfully established. Kinesthetic coordination abilities are to an extent influenced by school quintile statuses, gender and hand dominance, as differences occurred. It is recommended that Kinderkineticists in practice use the established norms of the five kinesthetic coordination tasks to identify children with possible proprioceptive functioning or kinesthetic coordination backlogs. This can be followed by the implementation of a programme that is specifically tailored to each child’s individual kinesthetic coordination backlogs. Future research on a larger sample size, in different provinces of South Africa, and on children of different age ranges is advised. It is also recommended that the reliability and validity of the five task items be established in future research.
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    An exploratory investigation of the effect of a sports vision program on Grade 4 and 5 female netball players' visual skills
    (MDPI, 2022) Coetzee, Dane; De Waal, Elna
    Vision is one of the most complex and dominant sensory systems necessary for information feedback from the environment. Few studies have already reported a positive effect of a sport vision program on elite sport teams’ visual skills; however, few studies have focused on the effect of sport vision programs on children’s visual skills. Therefore, the aim of this study was to determine the effect of a sports vision program on Grade 4 and 5 female netball players’ visual skills. Girls (N = 25) with a mean age of 10.08 years (SD = 0.65) formed part of this study. A pre-test–post-test design was followed with a retention test. The eight-week sports vision program was executed twice a week for 60 min on the experimental group (n = 13). The Developmental Test of Visual–Motor Integration (VMI-4), the Wayne Saccadic Fixator (WSF) and the Developmental Eye Movement (DEM) test were used to evaluate the girls’ visual skills, hand–eye coordination, visual reaction time, peripheral vision and saccadic eye movements. No statistical differences were found between the two groups before starting with the sports vision program. After intervention, significant differences between the two groups were reported, with the experimental group performing better in hand–eye coordination (p = 0.001) and reaction time (p = 0.001). Results further indicated that the experimental group experienced significant improvements (p ≤ 0.05) in motor coordination, hand–eye coordination, reaction speed and visual tracking after intervention with significant lasting effects (p ≤ 0.05). The control group performed significantly worse in reaction time (p = 0.01). A sports vision program can be recommended for Grade 4 and 5 female netball players to improve certain visual skills.