Health & body · 2024
Do students exercise harder when they can see their heart rate on a classroom screen?
Yes—in a small study, students exercised more intensely when their heart rates were displayed. Twenty students from one primary school, averaging about 12 years old, reached higher peak heart rates and spent longer above the target intensity during interval exercise with the display than without it. The finding concerns intensity during those sessions, not lasting fitness benefits.
Details
Researchers tested whether live heart-rate feedback could change how intensely students exercised in physical education. Over four weeks, each student completed four high-intensity interval exercise sessions with a heart-rate display and four without being able to see their heart rate. The order of the conditions was randomised. During display sessions, a shared classroom screen showed each student's heart rate in real time, with colours changing according to heart-rate level.
The target was 90% of maximum heart rate estimated from age. With the screen, students had higher peak heart rates and spent more time above that threshold. Student group discussions and teacher interviews suggested that the display encouraged students to reach the target and compete with classmates to work harder; these accounts do not establish why the measured changes occurred.
The study supports a short-term increase in exercise intensity in this setting. It involved only twenty volunteers from one school, and the abstract does not report how many additional minutes students spent above the target. It does not establish whether the effect persists or improves fitness over time.
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