**Abstract**

In this study, in order to clarify the relationship between health and physical strength, athletic capability, school life, and lifestyles, we collated the results of physical fitness tests with questionnaire surveys of 102 elementary school fifth-grade males and females. In the school life aspect, children who scored high on the physical fitness test, like Physical Education, enjoy learning, play well with friends while in the lifestyle aspect, they clean up their surroundings and rooms, study even without being told and there is a tendency for them to make their own plan. In addition, it was confirmed that children with high physical fitness test scores were in good condition, such as being healthy every day and hardly getting sick. On the other hand, in relation to the physical fitness test scores and the body shape by BMI, there were many high scorers among the children whose body figure was standard. These results suggest that physical fitness and athletic capability are related to children's school life and health, and that high physical fitness has a positive impact on children's school life and health.

**Keywords:** physique, physical fitness, school life, health, elementary school student

## **1. Introduction**

Physical strength is the source of human activity and an important element of "the power to live" such as abundant humanity, the ability to learn by oneself and the ability to think for themselves [1, 2].

In recent years, changes in the social environment and lifestyle have led to great changes in the environment surrounding children. There is a decrease in walking opportunities for children due to the development of transportation, the neglect of adults to disregard children's play and sports, a decrease in helping children's housework, and the development of information equipment, etc.

As a result, children's human relationships become weak, and there are fewer opportunities to have more friends and to move their bodies [1, 2].

Along with this, the current physical strength of children around 1985, has been declining over the long term in all ages, such as their running power, throwing power and gripping power, etc. [3].

Also, recently, the bipolarization of physical strength between children who are actively engaged in exercise and sports and those who lack exercise has been pointed out [4]. Children's lack of exercise is not just a decline in physical strength, but also has an adverse effect on the improvement of mental and physical health [5].

In a questionnaire survey on children's experience activities conducted by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology in 1998, a total of 33% of elementary school second graders answered that they "often" or "sometimes" feel tired on a daily basis and it is reported that it reaches 60% in the second grade of junior high school [6].

Also, there are quite a few children who have stress in their school life resulting in disturbed lifestyles such as spending a considerable amount of time studying at school, studying at cram school or at home, having insufficient sleeping time, being unable to sleep at night, being easy to get tired, having no desire for breakfast, wanting to speak out loud somehow and being frustrated with nothing.

Furthermore, disruption of children's lifestyles can have a negative impact on reduced energy and motivation and a lack of concentration [7]. It may be said that the lack of exercise in children greatly affects the development of their strength and growth.

Therefore, it is thought to be extremely important to examine athletic ability and physical strength which is the basis for living.

Up to now, many research endeavors have been conducted from various angles to solve this problem, and various improvement measures have been tried on how children's physical fitness and exercise capacity are related to school life and lifestyle and it is deemed necessary to conduct further verification.

Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine in detail the physical strength and athletic capability of elementary school students such as running ability, jumping ability, throwing ability and endurance and to clarify the relationship between health and physical strength, athletic capability, school life and lifestyle.

#### **2. Method**

#### **2.1 Participants**

A self-administered questionnaire survey was conducted for fifth graders of a public elementary school in Tokyo. There were 47 boys and 55 females for a total of 102 respondents.

#### **2.2 Investigation contents**

#### *2.2.1 Fitness test*

The physical fitness tests conducted at the school were: muscle strength: grip strength, muscle endurance: upper body, flexibility: sit and reach, agility: repeated sideways jump, whole body endurance: 20 m shuttle run, speed, running ability: 50 m run, muscle power, jumping ability: standing long jump, skill, and muscle power and throwing power: softball throwing. The results were recorded on a 10-point scale according to the score table for each item set by the Sports Bureau of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT). In addition, the total result was calculated by adding the scores of each item. Based on the comprehensive

#### *A Study on the Relationship between Health and Physical Fitness and School Life… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.110164*

evaluation criteria table of the new physical fitness test, comprehensive evaluation was obtained in five stages from A to E. A and B were set to "high," C was set to "standard," while D and E were set to "low."

#### *2.2.2 Figure*

At the school, the BMI was calculated from the height and weight of body measurements. Based on that, we used Kato's [8] age-specific BMI percentile curves up to 18 years old by classifying obesity, standard, and lean body types. The body type is determined by setting the 10 to 90 percentile value of each age in the BMI percentile curve as "standard" (15.0 to 18.5). In addition, "lean" is defined as less than this range, and "obesity" is defined as exceeding this range.

#### *2.2.3 Analysis method*

The physical fitness test and body type and each question item were examined by gender. Furthermore, we examined the relationship between physical strength tests and school life and health; and between physical strength tests and body types.

All analyzes were performed with SPSS19.0 for Windows, with a significance level of 5%. The χ2 test was used to test the ratio bias, and the unmatched t-test was used to test the difference between the average values of BMI and physical strength test results.

### **3. Result**

#### **3.1 Gender differences in physical characteristics and physical strength/athletic capability test results**

In terms of physical characteristics, the sitting height was 75.6 3.6 for boys and 77.3 3.7 for girls, with girls significantly higher than boys (p < 0.05) (**Table 1**). In the physical strength test, for softball throwing: the score was 21.72 6.97 m for boys and 11.87 3.32 m for girls (p < 0.001). In repeated sideways jumps, the score was 36.36 7.05 for boys and 33.51 33.51 for girls (p < 0.05). In the 20 m shuttle run, the boys had 43.60 20.84 times while the girls were 30.98 12.77 times (p < 0.001).

On the other hand, in the sit and reach test the score was 31.00 7.94 cm for boys and 38.00 8.73 cm for girls, with girls showing significantly higher results compared to boys (p < 0.000). The overall fitness test score was slightly higher for girls than for boys, but there was no significant difference. In addition, boys have low scores and little higher standard scores, while girls had slightly higher scores.

#### **3.2 Gender differences in physical fitness and athletic capability test evaluation**

The percentage of "high" scores for both boys and girls exceeded 50%, but the percentage of girls was slightly higher than that of boys. However, the percentage of "low" scores was slightly higher for boys than for girls, but no significant difference was observed (**Table 2**).


*Bridging Science and Practical Appliance in Resistance Training*

**6**

*Gender differences*

 *in physical* 

*characteristics*

 *and physical fitness test results.*

**Table 1.**


**Table 2.**

*Gender differences in physical fitness test evaluation.*

## **3.3 Gender differences in school life aspect, lifestyle aspect, health aspect, degree of obesity, and sleep time**

At school, many children answered that they were having fun. In particular, a high percentage of male respondents answered the items "I like physical education classes" and "play well with friends when playing" compared to girls. Compared with boys, girls responded more frequently to items such as "school is fun", "study is fun", and "has good friends" (**Table 3**). In terms of lifestyle habits, boys and girls accounted for more than 70% of the children who answered "yes" in the "staying at home alone" item. For most items, more children answered "No" than "Yes".

In the items "I have decided what I want to be in the future" and "I have something I want to do when I grow up" (p < 0.01), the percentage of "Yes" for girls was higher than that for boys.




*A Study on the Relationship between Health and Physical Fitness and School Life… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.110164*

#### **Table 3.**

*Gender differences in school life aspect, lifestyle aspect, health aspect, degree of obesity, and sleep time.*

In terms of health, most of the boys and girls were "very well" and "healthy" in the item "I spend time well every day". On the other hand, there were about 50% of children were feeling heavy or tired and sometimes get sick.

In terms of obesity, the percentage of leanness was slightly higher for girls than for boys, and the percentage of obesity was 27.7% for boys and 18.2% for girls, which was higher for boys. In the sleeping hours on weekdays, both boys and girls had a high rate of 8 hours to less than 9 hours. On holidays, boys had the highest rate of 8 hours to less than 9 hours, and girls had a slightly higher rate of 9 hours to less than 10 hours.

### **3.4 Relationship between physical strength and athletic capability test evaluation and school life**

Many children with high physical strength and athletic capability test evaluations answered that they enjoyed studying (p < 0.05), liked physical education at school (p


#### **Table 4.**

*Relationship between physical fitness test evaluation and school life.*

< 0.01) and played well with friends during play time (p < 0.001) (**Table 4**). Although it was not a significant difference, 80% of the children who answered "high" in the physical strength/athletic capability test said that school was fun. In addition, in the "I have good friends" item, there were almost no children answered it regardless of the high or low score of physical strength and physical capability test.
