Effect of Power Walking on the Body Shape of College Students Who Sit Long and Exercise Little

Abstract

At present, more and more Chinese college students prefer sitting long and exercising little, which is a very important cause of obesity. This paper introduces power walking as an intervention in the simplest and most convenient way, and observes the effect of exercise intervention on the body shape of college students who sit long and exercise little, so as to provide evidence for the prevention of obesity. A total of 120 college students who sit long and exercise little (with less than 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week and less than 5,000 steps per day) were given a power walking intervention of moderate intensity (50%-60% HRR) for 12 weeks, 3–6 times and 180 minutes a week. Their body shape indexes (height, weight, waist circumference, waist-to-hip ratio, body fat percentage) were measured and recorded before and after the intervention. SPSS17.0 and Excel are used for the statistical analysis. All the data are expressed as “mean ±standard deviation”, and means are compared by Paired Samples T -Test. P<0.05 indicates significant difference, P<0.01indicates very significant difference, P<0.001indicates an extremely significant difference, and P>0.05 indicates no statistical significance. Only 62 of the 120 subjects completed the intervention. After the power walking intervention, the body weight, BMI, waist circumference and body fat percentage of female college students decreased significantly (all: P <0.05); the BMI and waist-to-hip ratio of male college students decreased significantly (all: P < 0.05); the body weight, waist circumference and body fat percentage of male students decreased but had no statistical significance (all: P > 0.05); the waist-to-hip ratio of female students did not change significantly (P >0.05); the height of both male and female students did not change (all: P > 0.05). Power walking can significantly improve the body shape of female college students who sit long and exercise less, and can improve the body shape of male students but not as significantly as female students.