Self-assessment of physical fitness in adolescents

Abstract

Background: Physical fitness is an important indicator of the current and future health condition in adolescents. In comparison with institutional testing, self-assessment of physical fitness offers a number of benefits, including minimization or elimination of possible negative experience with inter-individual comparison in the context of motor diagnostics. The main objective of this paper is to determine the distribution normality of the resulting data and the intersexual differences in self-assessment of physical fitness using selected test items of the INDARES battery in adolescents. Methods: The study involved a total of 626 adolescents (345 boys and 281 girls) aged 11 to 19 years (14.56 ± 1.95 years) from selected cities in the Czech Republic. The participants performed self-testing of physical fitness by means of selected motor tests (push-ups, modified curl-ups, V-sit and reach and shoulder stretch) from the INDARES test battery. The Shapiro-Wilk test was used to determine the distribution normality of the self-testing data; the Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the significance of inter-sexual differences in the average self-testing results. Results: The results showed normal data distribution in most motor tests except the push-up motor test (in boys older than 15 years normality was confirmed). The analysis confirmed the published findings concerning significantly better outcomes offlexibility in girls compared with boys. Conclusion: The present study suggests that the results of self-testing roughly correspond with the published findings based on institutional physical fitness assessment.