Abstract
Injuries in skiing show sex-specific differences, especially when visual perception is reduced. Reduced visual perception impairs balance, which plays an important role in avoiding skiing injuries. However, males and females might cope differently with reduced visual perception. Thus, the aim of this study was to evaluate sex-related effects of environmental perturbations (reduced visual perception and listening to music) on ski-specific balance. Using a crossover design, ski-specific balance was tested in 50 young adults (50% female) in four conditions: with and without listening to music and/or with and without reduced visual perception (ski goggles with occlusion foil). A four × two (condition by sex) mixed ANOVA revealed a significant condition by sex interaction, partial η² = 0.06. Females showed an increase in balance from the condition without music/with normal visual perception to the condition with music/with normal visual perception, while males showed a decrease. Balance was significantly higher in females compared to males, partial η² = 0.31. The findings suggest that balance is affected differently by environmental perturbations in females and males. However, the differences observed were not in line with our initial hypotheses, which might be because the model was too simplistic for how visual/auditory perturbations may affect balance.
Highlights
Alpine skiing is associated with a certain risk of injuries
The findings suggest that balance is affected differently by environmental perturbations in females and males
These results suggest on one hand, that females and males may respond differently to the environmental perturbations used in the present study, on the other hand, it might be an indication that our relatively simple model for how visual or auditory perturbations may affect postural stability is too simplistic
Summary
Alpine skiing is associated with a certain risk of injuries. Injury rates of one injury per 1000 ski days have been reported in alpine regions for recreational skiers [1,2]. Behavioral, and neuromuscular factors have been discussed as explanatory factors for sex-specific differences in injury risk [3,4,5,6]. Another explanatory factor might be a sex-specific difference in coping with environmental perturbations. In this context, knee valgus moments during environmental perturbations (static laboratory skeleton imitating an opponent) were higher in females compared to males during sidestep cutting movements [7]
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