COMPARISON OF ACUTE EXERCISE RESPONSES BETWEEN CONVENTIONAL VIDEO GAMING AND ISOMETRIC RESISTANCE EXERGAMING

Bonetti, AJ, Drury, DG, Danoff, JV, and Miller, TA. Comparison of acute exercise responses between conventional video gaming and isometric resistance exergaming. J Strength Cond Res 24(7): 1799-1803, 2010-Exergaming is a relatively new type of entertainment that couples physical activity and video gaming. To date, research that has focused on the physiologic responses to exergaming has been focused exclusively on aerobic-type activities. The purpose of this project was to describe the acute exercise responses (i.e., oxygen uptake [(V) over dotO(2)], heart rate, and rate of perceived exertion [RPE]) to exergaming using full-body isometric muscle resistance and to determine whether these responses are different during single-versus opponent-based play. Male subjects (n = 32) were randomly and equally divided into either an experimental (EXP) or control (CON) group. Acute exercise responses ((V) over dotO(2), heart rate, and RPE) were measured in all subjects during both solo-and opponent-based video game play. Subjects in the EXP group played using a controller that relied on full-body isometric muscle resistance to manipulate the on-screen character, whereas CON subjects used a conventional handheld controller. During solo play, the EXP group exhibited significantly higher values for (V) over dotO(2) (9.60 +/- 0.50 mL/kg/min) and energy expenditure (3.50 +/- 0.14 kcal/min) than the CON group ((V) over dotO(2) 5.05 +/- 0.16 mL/kg/min; energy expenditure 1.92 +/- 0.07 kcal/min). These changes occurred with no significant differences in RPE or heart rate between the groups. These results suggest that whole-body isometric exergaming results in greater energy expenditure than conventional video gaming, with no increase in perceived exertion during play. This could have important implications regarding long-term energy expenditure in gamers.