Association of military-specific reaction time performance with physical fitness and visual skills.

BACKGROUND

The aim of the present study was to explore whether military-specific reaction time (RT) test performance is affected by individuals' physical and visual skills.

METHOD

In a single testing session, the military-specific Simple and Go, No-Go RT, aerobic power (20-m Multistage Shuttle Run test), maximal upper- and lower-body mechanical capacities (bench press and squat against different loads), and visual skills (multiple object tracking and dynamic visual acuity) of 30 young men (15 active-duty military personnel and 15 sport science students) were evaluated.

RESULTS

The main findings revealed that the Simple RT and Go, No-Go RT presented (1) with aerobic power non-significant small correlations in military personnel = -0.39 and -0.35, respectively) and non-significant negligible correlations in sport science students ( = -0.10 and 0.06, respectively), (2) inconsistent and generally non-significant correlations with the maximal mechanical capacities of the upper- and lower-body muscles ( range = -0.10, 0.67 and -0.27, 0.48, respectively), (3) non-significant correlations with visual skills ( magnitude ≥ 0.58) with the only exception of the Go, No-Go RT that was significantly correlated to all visual variables in the group of students (., students who achieved better results during visual tests had shorter RT; magnitude ≥ 0.58), and (4) none of the physical and visual variables significantly predicted the Simple RT or Go, No-Go RT.

CONCLUSION

Altogether, these results indicate that military-specific RT performance is generally independent of physical and visual skills in both military personnel and active university students.