Relationship between socioeconomic status and physical fitness in junior high school students.

BACKGROUND: Research on physical fitness often regards socioeconomic status (SES) as a confounding factor. However, few studies investigate the impact of SES on fitness. This study investigated the impact of SES on physical fitness in both males and females, with an economic-based construct of SES. METHODS: The sample consisted of 954 6th, 7th, and 8th graders from a public, urban, Illinois middle school. The students participated in the FITNESSGRAM battery of fitness assessments as part of physical education. Descriptive statistics were calculated for height, weight, age, and sex. Students were grouped as high or low SES depending on whether they qualified for the federal free lunch program. A multivariate analysis of variance controlled for age and stratified by sex compared the raw scores from the fitness test for low and high SES students. Odds ratios stratified by sex were calculated for the likelihood of not achieving the FITNESSGRAM Healthy Fitness Zone standards among SES groups. RESULTS: Girls of the low SES group had significantly lower scores on the FITNESSGRAM assessments and were significantly less likely to achieve Healthy Fitness Zone status than the girls from the high SES groups. For boys, SES was a significant main effect for body composition but not for the other fitness tests conducted. CONCLUSION: SES is related to physical fitness in girls but not in boys. A potential explanation for this is that boys are more likely to engage in vigorous leisure time activity regardless of SES than girls.

Physical fitness and academic performance in middle school students.

AIM: The purpose of this study was to determine whether physical fitness is linked to academic success in middle school students. METHODS: The FITNESSGRAM test battery assessed students (n = 838) in the five components of health-related fitness. The Illinois Standardized Achievement Test (ISAT) was used to assess academic achievement in reading and math. RESULTS: The largest correlations were seen for aerobic fitness and muscular endurance (ranging from 0.12 to 0.27, all p < 0.05). Boys in the Healthy Fitness Zone (HFZ) for aerobic fitness or muscular endurance were 2.5-3 times more likely to pass their math or reading exams. Girls in the HFZ for aerobic fitness were approximately 2-4 times as likely to meet or exceed reading and math test standards. CONCLUSIONS: Aerobic capacity and muscular endurance seem to positively affect academic achievement in middle school students.