Motor abilities and relative age effect of adolescents

Abstract

The present study examined the relative age effects (RAE) of adolescents from Bosnia and Herzegovina. The purposes of this study were to evaluate motor performances of adolescent students (boys and girls), and to examine the effects of relative age among relatively older and relatively younger boys, and between relatively older and relatively younger girls, respectively. Motor skills were assessed by the Eurofit battery of motor tests. A one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was applied to examine the differences between the groups. Normality of distribution was determined with Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and skewness and kurtosis. If the assumption of a normal distribution for the data was violated, the Mann-Whitney U test. The results indicated significant differences in motor performance boys RAE groups in two measures, while there were no differences between the relatively older and relatively younger girls. The results indicate that the RAE is less evident in mid-adolescence in both, girls and boys. These findings may be useful for physical education (PE) teachers in PE lessons planning.

Keywords

• motor skills
• secondary school students
• bosnia and herzegovina