小学校高学年児童における疾走中の腕振り動作の特徴：

性差と能力差に着目して

抄録

　The purpose of this study was to clarify the characteristics of the arm swing movements of upper grade elementary school children during sprinting from the viewpoint of gender and differences in sprinting ability.
　Fifty-three children were asked to run 50 m and filmed from the side with a video camera. The subjects were then classified into 3 groups on the basis of their 50-meter sprinting time: an Excellent group (Group E), a Poor group (Group P), and an Average group (Group A). Kinematic data for the arm swing movements were then calculated and compared according to gender and differences in sprinting ability. The main results were as follows.
　1) A gender difference in upper arm movement was found in the minimum segment angle of the upper arm: girls swung their arms more forward than boys, even when groups with similar sprinting times were compared.
　2) When differences in upper arm movement were examined for each gender, it was found that the boys in group E showed significantly larger differences than those in groups A and P, and that group E swung their arms back and forth more widely than the other groups. With regard to upper arm angular velocity, which is an index of “arm swing speed”, group E group showed a significantly larger value than group P, and group E showed a faster backward arm swing. On the other hand, no such tendency was observed in girls, and no significant difference was found among the 3 groups with different sprinting speeds.
　3) In terms of gender differences in elbow joint movement, there were no significant differences in either angle or angular velocity between boys and girls.
　4) When the difference in elbow joint movement was examined for each gender, the maximum angle for girls in group E was significantly greater than that for girls in group A, but there were no significant differences in other areas.
　The above results indicate that the concepts of “swinging the arms back and forth significantly” and “swinging the arms fast”, which have been considered central for teaching during sprinting, are applicable to boys but not necessarily to girls. Furthermore, the concept of “maintaining elbow flexion” was not supported for both sexes.