Purpose: The purpose of this study was to provide an epidemiological profile of injuries sustained by participants in fitness activities in Victoria, Australia, based on hospital admissions and emergency department (ED) presentations and to identify the most common types, causes, and sites of these injuries. Method: Hospital-treated fitness…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the reliability of cardiorespiratory and pelvic kinematic responses to simulated horseback riding (SHBR) and to characterize responses to SHBR relative to walking in apparently healthy children. Method: Fifteen healthy children (Mage = 9.5 ± 2.6 years) completed SHBR on a commercially available…

Evidence strongly supports a positive, causal effect of physical activity on bone strength and suggests long-term benefits of childhood physical activity to the prevention of osteoporosis. The contribution of healthy bone development in youth is likely to be as important to fracture prevention as the amount of late adulthood bone loss. Families,…

Numerous methods are available to assess physical activity (PA) but systematic observation (SO) excels in being able to provide contextually rich data on the setting in which the activity occurs. As SO is particularly useful for determining how activity is influenced by the immediate physical and social environments, its use is becoming more…

Purpose: Recent evidence of the hot hand in sport--where success breeds success in a positive recency of successful shots, for instance--indicates that this pattern does not actually exist. Yet the belief persists. We used 2 studies to explore the effects of framing on the hot hand belief in sport. We looked at the effect of sport experience and…

Purpose: A signature characteristic of positive youth development (PYD) programs is the opportunity to develop life skills, such as social, behavioral, and moral competencies, that can be generalized to domains beyond the immediate activity. Although context-specific instruments are available to assess developmental outcomes, a measure of…

While Dama square dance is gaining popularity in China, especially with middle-aged and older-adult women--hence the "Dama" (Chinese for "big mamas") moniker--there have been conflicts due to the loud music played for the activity. After a brief explanation of Dama square dance and a description of the context of the conflicts,…

In "Physical Education Teacher Effectiveness in a Public Health Context," we took a broad view of physical education (PE) teacher effectiveness that included public health need and support for PE. Public health officials have been consistent and fervent in their support of PE, and for more than two decades, they have called on schools to…

Purpose: This systematic review describes the state of the art of the impact of hypothyroidism on exercise tolerance and physical performance capacity in untreated and treated patients with hypothyroidism. Method: A systematic computer-aided search was conducted using biomedical databases. Relevant studies in English, German, and Dutch, published…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the association between objectively measured physical activity and hearing sensitivity among a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults with diabetes. Method: Data from the 2003-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were used. One hundred eighty-four U.S. adults with diabetes…

Purpose: Identification of factors that relate to physical activity behavior in children at higher risk for weight problems--namely, children with obese parents--is key to informing the development of effective interventions to promote physical activity and reduce obesity. The purpose of our study was to examine children's perceptions of…

Purpose: Because walking is highly recommended for prevention and treatment of obesity and some of its biomechanical aspects are not clearly understood for overweight people, we compared the absolute and normalized ground reaction forces (GRF), plantar pressures, and temporal parameters of normal-weight and overweight participants during…

This commentary details a news event in which Carrie Weber Middle School in Port Washington, NY, supposedly banned students from using balls, playing tag, and doing cartwheels during recess. Public reaction in the form of news items, tweets, blogs, and commentary is sampled, and news releases from the Weber Middle School that were barely covered…

Growth, maturation, and development dominate the daily lives of children and adolescents for approximately the first 2 decades of life. Growth and maturation are biological processes, while development is largely a behavioral process. The 3 processes occur simultaneously and interact. They can be influenced by physical activity and also can…

With the recent emphasis on evaluating teachers' effectiveness by the performance of their students, it should be no surprise that this subject has reached the physical education (PE) sector. This commentary examines 3 articles by Rink (2013), McKenzie and Lounsbery (2013), and Ward (2013), who each take a different perspective on measuring…