2016 Volume 61 Issue 4 Pages 310-318
In the later years, a polarized tendency is observed in motor ability of preschool children, in particular, in a standing broad jump. This study determines the difference in standing broad jump between current preschool children and those 30 years before and their relations with activities in daily life, including cognitive functioning. The participants included 2,329 healthy children aged 3 to 6 years in Ishikawa Prefecture. They performed standing broad jump test. In addition, the assessment of the state of each child’s activity in the nursery school was performed by the caregivers. The representative values (mean and standard deviation) of data on 32,538 children studied in the same manner in 1985 were utilized for comparison. A two-way analysis of variance was performed to reveal the mean differences between children from both the periods (1985 and 2013) and of each age (age 3, 4, 5, and 6) on standing broad jump test. The results revealed that the current children had lower scores than those of 1985, and the overall ratios of children having lower scores had increased. From the comparison of the standing broad jump index (standing broad jump/height), it was suggested that the number of children who could not jump well using their own body had increased in comparison with those of 1985. In addition, it was suggested that the standing broad jump was related with the cognitive function such as “understanding” “concentration,” and “judgement.” The caregivers at the nursery will have to assess the standing broad jump based on the above results in the future.
