School of Health and Sport Sciences, University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia.
Musculoskeletal Science & Sports Medicine Research Centre, Manchester Metropolitan University, United Kingdom.
J Sci Med Sport. 2019 May;22(5):526-531. doi: 10.1016/j.jsams.2018.11.015. Epub 2018 Nov 22.
The International Paralympic Committee has mandated that International Sport Federations develop sport-specific classification systems that are evidence-based. This study examined the predictive and convergent validity of instrumented tapping tasks to classify motor coordination impairments in Para swimming.
Cross-sectional.
Thirty non-disabled participants and twenty-one Para swimmers with brain injury completed several instrumented tapping tasks as an assessment of upper and lower limb motor coordination. Para swimmers also completed a maximal freestyle swim to obtain a performance measure. The predictive and convergent validity of instrumented tapping tasks was examined by establishing differences in test measures between participants with and without brain injury and defining the strength of association between test measures and maximal freestyle swim speed in Para swimmers, respectively.
Random forest successfully classified 96% of participants with and without brain injury using test measures derived from instrumented tapping tasks. Most test measures had moderate to high correlations (r=0.54 to 0.72; p<0.01) with maximal freestyle swim speed and collectively explained up to 72% of the variance in maximal freestyle swim performance in Para swimmers with brain injury.
The results of this study evidence the predictive and convergent validity of instrumented tapping tasks to classify motor coordination impairments in Para swimmers with brain injury. These tests can be included in revised Para swimming classification to improve the objectivity and transparency in determining athlete eligibility and sport class for these Para athletes.
国际残奥委会要求各国际体育联合会制定基于证据的专项分类系统。本研究旨在检验基于仪器的敲击任务在分类脑损伤的残疾游泳运动员运动协调障碍方面的预测性和收敛有效性。
横断面研究。
30 名非残疾参与者和 21 名脑损伤的残疾游泳运动员完成了几项基于仪器的敲击任务，以评估上下肢运动协调能力。残疾游泳运动员还完成了一次最大自由泳，以获得表现测量值。通过确定有和没有脑损伤的参与者之间的测试指标差异，并分别定义测试指标与残疾游泳运动员最大自由泳速度之间的关联强度，来检验基于仪器的敲击任务的预测性和收敛有效性。
随机森林成功地使用基于仪器的敲击任务得出的测试指标，将 96%的有和没有脑损伤的参与者进行了分类。大多数测试指标与最大自由泳速度具有中度到高度相关性（r=0.54 至 0.72；p<0.01），并且在脑损伤的残疾游泳运动员中，这些测试指标总共可以解释最大自由泳表现的 72%的变异性。
本研究结果证明了基于仪器的敲击任务在分类脑损伤的残疾游泳运动员运动协调障碍方面的预测性和收敛有效性。这些测试可以被纳入修订后的残疾游泳分类中，以提高确定这些残疾运动员的运动员资格和运动等级的客观性和透明度。
