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The Impact of Exercise Interventions on Motor Competence and Health...
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The Impact of Exercise Interventions on Motor Competence and Health in Children

A special issue of Sports (ISSN 2075-4663).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 April 2027 | Viewed by 1010

Editors

Prof. Dr. Michael Duncan

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Centre for Sport, Exercise and Life Sciences, Coventry University, Coventry CV1 5FB, UK
Interests: physical activity; movement assessment; motor competence; interventions; children and adolescents
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Matteo Crotti

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Human and Social Science, University of Bergamo, 24127 Bergamo, Italy
Interests: physical activity; movement assessment; motor competence; interventions; children and adolescents
Dr. Hannah Goss

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Health and Human Performance, Dublin City University, D09 NA55 Dublin, Ireland
Interests: physical literacy; health and well-being; interventions; children and adolescents

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The development of motor competence is essential in enabling individuals to engage in health-enhancing physical activity, promoting academic achievement and positive mental well-being. However, children’s competence in motor tasks is suggested to be below normative standards, resulting in developmental delay and other negative consequences for children. Exercise and physical activity interventions are commonly employed as a means to improve children’s motor competence, whilst also having other favourable impacts on health and well-being.

This Special Issue invites contributions from across the spectrum of health, sport and exercise, social and life sciences, examining the issues of exercise interventions and their effects on motor competence and physiology in children physical activity, exercise and obesity in children.

This Special Issue is open to original research, review articles, short reports, brief commentaries, case reports, and meta-analyses related to physical activity and exercise interventions on motor competence and related health and related variables. The keywords listed below suggest just a few of the many possibilities.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

  • Cross-sectional and longitudinal association of motor competence, physical activity, fitness and related health variables during childhood;
  • Environmental, sociocultural, and biological correlates of physical activity and motor competence during childhood;
  • Interaction of physical activity, motor competence, obesity, and health markers during childhood and adolescence;
  • Intervention strategies targeting physical activity and motor competence during childhood;
  • Process evaluation of interventions designed to enhance physical activity and motor competence during childhood;
  • Association of motor competence and physical fitness at young ages with lifestyle habits later in life;
  • Measurement issues related to physical activity, exercise and motor competence from infancy through to adolescence.

Prof. Dr. Michael Duncan
Dr. Matteo Crotti
Dr. Hannah Goss
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sports is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • motor skills
  • physical activity
  • exercise
  • fitness
  • measurement
  • intervention
  • process evaluation
  • imple-mentation
  • public health
  • physical activity promotion

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

14 pages, 863 KB  
Article
Effects of a 10-Week Wushu Program on Static, Dynamic, and Dual-Task Balance and Physical Fitness in Preschool Children
by Beibei Luo, Yujie Xu, Yunya Zhang, Rongda Wang, Meifeng Gu, Jingjing Wang, Yanmei Shi, Zhibei Zhou, Rui Li and Xuting Zhu
Sports 2026, 14(7), 286; https://doi.org/10.3390/sports14070286 - 7 Jul 2026
Viewed by 361
Abstract
Background: As a traditional Chinese exercise, Wushu has been shown to effectively promote balance and postural stability in various populations. Preschoolers’ capacity for balance control, including static, dynamic, and dual-task balance, is linked to the later development of stability skills in adulthood. However, [...] Read more.
Background: As a traditional Chinese exercise, Wushu has been shown to effectively promote balance and postural stability in various populations. Preschoolers’ capacity for balance control, including static, dynamic, and dual-task balance, is linked to the later development of stability skills in adulthood. However, studies of Wushu intervention focusing on balance ability and the related physical fitness in preschool children are limited. Objectives: This study investigated the effects of a 10-week Wushu program on static, dynamic dual-task balance and physical fitness in children 5–6 years old. Methods: Seventy-three participants were randomly divided into an intervention (INT, n = 39) and a control (CON, n = 34) group. The INT group participated in a 10-week Wushu program that included three 30 min sessions per week, while the CON group engaged in unstructured free play with purposely designed materials. The three key primary outcomes were dominant-leg stance for static balance, the balance beam walk for dynamic balance, and the center of pressure (CoP) path length obtained via a force platform during dual-task balance testing, in which the participants were instructed to count numbers backward. The five derived primary outcomes were non-dominant-leg stance, CoP ML path length, CoP AP path length, CoP sway velocity, and CoP sway area. Secondary outcomes were physical fitness indicators, including sit and reach, grip strength, standing long jump (SLJ), countermovement jump (CMJ), 15 m zigzag run, double-leg continuous jump, height and body weight. The analysis of the outcomes was conducted using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) and Pearson correlation. Results: At baseline, the CON and INT groups did not differ significantly. The INT demonstrated significant enhancements in comparison with CON in the dominant and non-dominant-leg stance (p = 0.017 and p = 0.005, respectively), the balance beam walk, SLJ, 15 m zigzag run and double-leg continuous jump (all p < 0.05), along with the mediolateral CoP path length (p = 0.012). A strong correlation was found between the balance beam walk and the double-leg continuous jump (r = 0.55, p = 0.001), and between the balance beam walk and the 15 m zigzag run (r = 0.43, p = 0.015). Conclusions: The present study demonstrates that a 10-week Wushu program significantly enhances preschool children’s static balance, dynamic balance, and mediolateral postural control during dual-task condition. The improvements in dynamic balance are correlated with lower-limb coordination and jumping agility. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Impact of Exercise Interventions on Motor Competence and Health in Children)
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