Effect of Awris Traditional Dances on Health-Related Physical Fitness Traits among High School Students in Ethiopia

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of Awris traditional dance Tigray regional state on health related physical fitness traits among high school students. To achieve the purpose of this study, 40 high school students were selected randomly. And their age ranged between 15 and 17 years. The selected participants were categorized into experimental and control group with twenty (n=20) subjects in each. The experimental group performed traditional dances for a period of 16 weeks three days per week whereas participants in the control group were informed to follow their usual daily activity. All participants were tested on selected criterion measures on muscular strength, flexibility, cardiovascular endurance and body composition prior to and after the 16 weeks of the training period. The data pertaining to the variables in this study were statistically examined by using SPSS statistical software version 25. Descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation were found in order to get the basic idea of the data distribution. Independent t- test was employed for finding whether there was any statistically significant pre-test to post-test mean differences in their respective variables of each group. Level of significant was set at 0.05. Following the 16-weeks traditional dance training, significant change was observed on muscular strength and cardiovascular endurance, but there was no significant improvement in flexibility and body composition as compare the experimental groups with the control group. Therefore it can be concluded that Awris traditional dance training program can notably improve muscular strength and cardiovascular endurance of high school students.