Several faculty members in the Gordon E. Inman College of Health Sciences & Nursing recently joined with colleagues in the Department of Sports Science at Belmont University for an interdisciplinary research project that assessed associations of predominantly sedentary behaviors and physical activity status with physical fitness among college students.
Three members of the Health Sciences faculty – Dr. Lynn Shores, Professor of Nursing; Dr. Jeanne Sowers, Associate Professor of Occupational Therapy; and Dr. Christine Manville, Assistant Professor of Occupational Therapy – were among six research team members from Belmont and Vanderbilt universities who coauthored the study. Other Belmont team members included Dr. Sarah Adams, Associate Professor of Sports Science, and Dr. Patrick Schneider, Associate Professor of Sports Science. Dr. Mary Dietrich, Research Associate Professor and Statistician at the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, was also part of the team.

A number of doctoral students in the School of Occupational Therapy assisted in the study of 122 students in a general education wellness class at Belmont. Participants completed a physical fitness battery consisting of cardiorespiratory fitness, muscular endurance, body composition and flexibility measurements. In addition, they completed a survey to assess time spent in predominantly sedentary behaviors including computer and internet use, television watching, texting and playing video games. Self-reported physical activity levels were also assessed to determine if participants were inactive, insufficiently active or active according to the aerobic component of the current physical activity recommendation. Tests of gender differences in each of the study variables were also conducted.
The findings will be presented on June 2 by Dr. Schneider at the American College of Sports Medicine’s World Congress on Exercise in Medicine in Denver, Colorado.