Measuring the impact on the physical condition in school children exposed to Exergaming

From the sociology’s point of view, school age children are known as generation Z, a group known for their ability to embrace technology and the access to information at a rate faster than their predecessors. This has facilitated the transition to videogames that involve physical activity. An initiative that has been created recently, is to use video game platforms to promote physical activity in children (Exergaming). Therefore it should be possible to promote a healthy lifestyle at this age. However, it is important to know the scope and limitations of the commercial version of these products, so we can measure their actual impact. This knowledge will help to generate improvements to the existing proposals, and develop, if feasible, holistic programs based on these platforms. For the reasons mentioned above, we propose an interdisciplinary study directed towards the exploration of the determinants that impact the effectiveness of physical activity based on video game platforms, in school-age children with obesity and overweight problems. The determinants to be examined are: Strength, psychomotor response and resistance, as well as a set of psychological variables such as learning modality, parental style and anxiety propensity. A sample of 100 school age children from Montemorelos, Mexico will be used for this study. (This is the first scientific project propose by an SDA institution that is approved and funded by the Mexican Science Counsil)