Article Clinical Medicine General Medicine Social Medicine

A proposal concerning exercise intensity with the Nintendo Ring Fit Adventure Exergame among older adults: A preliminary study

The Nintendo Ring Fit Adventure (RFA) (Nintendo, Kyoto, Japan) is a novel exergame that combines exercise and video game elements. Although previous RFA intervention studies have reported the health effects of the RFA, exercise intensity among older adults has not yet been documented. We hypothesized that the exercise intensity of older adults in the current RFA setting may be low. This preliminary study developed a range of prototype RFA intensity conditions and to evaluate exercise intensity among older adults. Six older adults (1 male/5 females, mean age 75.2±10.3 years old) participated in this study. Three RFA conditions were developed: "LOW" (the ‘default’ load. Older individual input actual gender and age), "MODERATE" (as defined by the American College of Sports Medicine [ACSM]: 40%-59% heart rate reserve [HRR]), and "HIGH" (highest exercise intensity that older individuals could set in the game). Exercise intensity was assessed using the %HRR. The results show that the %HRR values for the conditions were 34.9%±4.1% (LOW), 40.0%±2.9% (MODERATE), and 52.3%±3.1% (HIGH). In conclusion, this preliminary study showed that, among the three prototype RFA conditions, both MODERATE and HIGH conditions generally attain moderate or greater intensity for older adults when assessed using the heart rate.

View more >>

Article Electrical and Electronic Engineering Information Sciences

Development of Sensing Unit “xG-1” for Visualizing Team Plays

The authors have developed "xG-1", a sports sensing unit capable of visualizing the performance and flow of play while recognizing each player in field sports such as soccer, rugby, and American football. Utilization of this sensing unit in the field of sports makes it possible to provide scientific data-driven services with the aim of transforming subjective coaching methods based on experience into new coaching methods based on data. This system consists of sensor devices and software, utilizing real-time kinematic (RTK) positioning, which is a surveying technology. Therefore, the system not only provides highly accurate positional data in real time but also visualizes the overall performance of the entire team, including formation analysis. This allows one-stop management of the overall team and individual performance, as well as efficient information management of the player's exercise load. "xG-1" can support sports businesses by providing highly extensible API and SDK and linking data among end users and systems. In the future, we aim to develop a global open data platform.

View more >>

Article Psychology

Decision making under virtual environment triggers more aggressive tactical solutions

Virtual reality is a promising technology that can be used to assess and train decision-making skills in sports. However, it is not necessarily clear what benefits this technology offers compared to previous technologies. The present study investigated the differences in option generation related to tactical decision-making when the same tactical scene was observed in 2D video and 3D VR. Soccer players (N = 27) were asked to observe tactical scenes and verbally report as many tactical options as possible under 2D video and 3D VR conditions. They were classified into high-, medium-, or low-decision capability groups based on the decision-making test. Irrespective of the capability, the 2D video and 3D VR had the same number of generated options. However, 3D VR generated more aggressive options that led to the goal, even though the exact same scene was observed between the conditions. This result may be because 3D VR can reproduce more realistic information exploration behavior than 2D video. Given that differences were observed regardless of skill level, the results suggest that VR technology has the potential for use as a more accurate decision evaluation method and effective training tool compared to previous methods for a wide variety of learners.

View more >>

Article Information Sciences

Development of Laser Scanner Units for UAV

In its i-Construction policy, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism has stipulated a manual for public surveying using by UAV photogrammetry with the aim of improving productivity at construction sites. However, UAV photogrammetry requires a huge amount of time to generate point cloud data from photographs, causing a problem that it is difficult to monitor the daily progress of the construction site. There is another problem that it is incapable of taking measurements except daylight hours. Against this backdrop, we have been developing laser scanner units for UAV equipped with LiDAR, IMU and GNSS receiver. Then, we clarified the error factors that are expected to affect the precision prescribed of point cloud data and summarized the requirements for the onboard equipment and the method of generating point cloud data. However, we have not yet proposed nor developed the laser scanner units as well as for generating point cloud data considering these requirements. Thus, in this paper, we developed the laser scanner units and a new method for generating point cloud data within the laser scanner units to optimize the error factors based on these requirements clarified in the existing study.

View more >>

Article Psychology

Changing weight perception using augmented reality

Augmented reality (AR) is a technology that renders computer-generated (CG) images onto the physical world in real time. To establish technology to alter weight perception using CG images in an AR environment, we investigated whether the size of virtual objects superimposed on a physical object would affect perceived heaviness. Participants (n = 22) wore a head-mounted display with a stereo camera and observed an object overlaid with a CG image. They lifted the object vertically and rated its subjective heaviness. We found that the virtually smaller object was perceived to be heavier than the virtually larger object among a large share of participants, indicating that a well-known phenomenon, the size-weight illusion (SWI), occurred. The SWI did not occur when the virtual size became larger or smaller after movement to reach the object was initiated. Our results suggest that presenting virtual objects in an AR environment effectively altered weight perception.

View more >>

Article Business & Management Economics Education Others Psychology

The Effect of Auditory Stimulation on College Sports Team and University Identification of Media Spectators: Focusing on the Presence or Absence of Live Play-by-Play Announcements and Commentary

This study aimed to determine how college sports team identifications and university identifications of college sports media viewers differ depending on the presence or absence of live play-by-play announcements and commentary. The participants in the experiment were 115 students from University A. A screening survey was conducted to confirm that these were essential attributes, resulting in 58 and 57 participants in the groups with commentary and without commentary, respectively. We conducted an Internet survey with these two groups of experimental participants before and after watching videos of the games. The results showed that only the group with commentary demonstrated improvements in the "public evaluation" of the college sports team and university identification (College sports team: F (1, 113) = 5.28, p < .05; University: F (1, 113) = 5.28, p < .05).

View more >>

Article Information Sciences

Measurement of Motor-vehicle Traffic Volume Using Camera Images and Artificial Intelligence

In Japan, road traffic censuses are conducted to assess road traffic conditions. Recently, techniques for counting traffic volume from video images have been attracting considerable attention in order to improve work efficiency and save labor, and a large number of technologies have been developed. However, since traffic volume surveys are often conducted 24 hours a day, day and night, at various sites and under various weather conditions, existing technologies have yet to reach the counting accuracy required in practice. The authors aim to develop techniques for traffic volume surveys applicable in practice by applying artificial intelligence. This paper reports the results of a case study in which the proposed techniques were applied to the video taken during actual traffic volume surveys.

View more >>

Article Education Psychology

Creating a scale for measuring non-cognitive abilities developed through sports for elementary school students

The purpose of this study was to create a scale to measure non-cognitive skills that can be developed through sport. To begin, a draft of a non-cognitive ability measurement scale was developed based on previous research. A preliminary survey of 346 elementary school students (318 males and 28 females, mean age 8.90 ± 1.76 years) was conducted, and a preliminary scale was created using exploratory factor analysis. A subsequent main survey was conducted with 1171 elementary school students (1025 males and 146 females, mean age 8.77 ± 1.73). In the present study, confirmatory factor analysis, reliability testing using cronbach's alpha, and structural validity of the entire scale were examined using structural analysis of covariance. Furthermore, theoretical interpretations were also taken into account, and finally, a non-cognitive ability measurement scale that can be developed through sports for elementary school students was created, consisting of 50 items with 5 factors: "self-management," "problem-solving," "cooperativeness," "leadership," and "greetings/polite".

View more >>

Article Biology Environmental Sciences General Medicine Life Sciences and Basic Medicine Social Medicine

Relationship between physical education in the first year of university and exercise habits and physical and mental health in the following spring

The present study examined the relationship between taking physical education and health-related courses in the first year of university and the acquisition and maintenance of exercise habits and physical and mental health in the student’s second year. The study population consisted of university students was 2,483 in FY2017 and 2,352 in FY2018. Of these, the 2,293 students (1,744 men, 18.5 ± 1.0 years old; 549 women, 18.6 ± 1.0 years old) who responded to the self-administered questionnaire survey on daily living habits in both years were included in the analysis. The results showed that taking physical education and health-related courses in the first year was significantly related to exercise habits the following spring. The results also suggested that these courses were more strongly related to mental health than physical health. In addition, men were significantly more likely to acquire a new exercise habit and had more improved mental health. In the future, it is necessary to clarify the causal relationship between taking physical education and health-related courses and exercise habits and the maintenance and acquisition of physical and mental health, in addition to developing effective support methods for students who dislike gender differences and exercise.

View more >>

Article Education Others

Proposal of Rubric for Information Security Education Materials

This study proposes a generic rubric that can be used as an assessment axis for information security educational materials regarding existing computer science education evaluation standards to assess the learning effectiveness of information security educational materials aimed at young people. The proposed rubric includes items such as “understanding of cyber security” and “understanding why passwords are necessary,” and five-level learning objectives are defined for these items. Furthermore, the proposed rubric was used to assess the existing information security educational material “Hajimete no Joho Security (Learning First Information Security in a Different World)” using Minecraft. The proposed rubric was mapped to the learning contents of the teaching material as an assessment method, and the learning effectiveness of the teaching material was measured using Minecraft with the cooperation of a community center project in Sayama City in Japan. Therefore, we were able to evaluate the learning effects using the proposed rubric.

View more >>