Abstract:
The purposes of this research were to study and compare the effects of arm swinging on the heart rate, systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, and body weight of elderly women and with different lengths of exercise time.Thirty female subjects between 60 70 years old were selected by purpose random sampling from 40 people. All had been checked by a physician, and certified as fit enough for the exercise. Further more, they have never had any prior experience in doing the arm swings. The selected group was equally divided into three subgroups according to their heart beat rates at rest. The three groups, one control and the other two experimental, were to do the following:The control group was asked to continue with their daily routine. The latter two experimental groups were asked to do the arm swings in a 12-week period but with different lengths of time. The arm swing regimen for the first experimental group from the first to fourth week, the fifth to eighth week and the ninth to twelfth week was 10,15 and 20 minutes, respectively, whereas that for the second experimental group was 10, 20 and 30 minutes, respectively.The results were as follows:1. The exercise regimens of both groups not only lowered both the resting heart rates and blood pressure taken at rest hut also contribute to weight loss of the elderly women participating in the experiment.2. The effects of the exercise on the resting heart rates and blood pressure taken at rest and the weight loss were not significantly different at 0.5 level between the two experimental groups, but were between those and the control group.