The effects of Shotokan karate training on self-concept and Eastern cultural value orientation of college men and women

This quasi-experimental study was designed to investigate the effects of Shotokan karate training on self-concept and Eastern cultural value orientation of college men and women. One hundred sixty-one students in university educational foundations classes, health education classes, and physical education swimming and karate classes served as subjects. The Tennessee Self-Concept Scale (TSCS) and the East-West Questionnaire (EWQ) were administered at pre- and post-semester to obtain scores on self-concept, its subcomponents, and Eastern cultural value orientation, respectively. Null hypotheses stated there would be no significant differences among the groups on measures of self-concept, its subcomponents, and Eastern cultural value orientation. The levels of significance were set at p $\u3c$ 0.05 for the self-concept and Eastern cultural value orientation scores and p $\u3c$ 0.01 for the subcomponent scores. The results showed no statistical significance among the groups on the measures of self-concept, its subcomponents, and Eastern cultural value orientation. Analysis of covariance was used since it has been shown to be useful to test for differences in mean scores among groups of subjects that occur naturally and intact in educational settings. Although the data indicated there were positive gains in mean scores on total self-concept and Eastern cultural value orientation for the control and the karate groups and negative gains on both variables for the swimming group, these changes were not statistically significant. Therefore, the results failed to find support for the research hypotheses