37th Annual Student Research Conference
Inter-Tester and Intra-Tester Reliability for Skinfold Measurements Testing for Body Fat Prediction
Chance P. Orf♦* and Paul J. Haarmann♦
Dr. Jerry Mayhew and Dr. Brandy Schneider, Faculty Mentors
Athletic trainers are often called upon to perform weight certifications through skinfold (SKF) measurements for high school wrestlers to identify their ideal body weight for competition. Variability of measurement among testers could affect the weight class in which wrestlers are allowed to compete. The purpose of this study was to compare within-day and between-day variability of testers in SKF measurement. Two testers measured fifteen male collegiate athletes at the chest, abdomen, and thigh sites on two separate days. Test-retest reliability within testers ranged from r=0.78 to r=0.96 for tester 1 and from r=0.87 to r=0.98 for tester 2. Using the Jackson-Pollock equation, predicted percent fat values were not significantly different (p = 0.910) between testers. These results suggest that minimal practice may be necessary to achieve comparable skinfold measurements and predicted percent fat values between testers when evaluating athletes.
Keywords: skinfold, body composition, Jackson-Pollock equation
Topic(s):Athletic Training
Presentation Type: Oral Presentation
Session: 205-4
Location: SUB 3201
Time: 11:15
♦ Indicates Truman Graduate Student