Unit 5

Unit 5 Research Project
Worthing College Sports Science
Alfie Dunk
2015

Is there a relationship between body composition
and short, medium and long term injury rates in
rugby?
P2: Carry out / P4: Produce

Abstract
The aim of this research study was to investigate if there a relationship between
body composition and short, medium and long term injury rates in rugby. The BMIs
of 36 male 16-19 year old rugby players was taken. Following this the participants
filled out a survey (appendix 1) to obtain data on their short, medium and long term
injury records. The results show that BMI and short term injuries have a moderate
positive correlation (0.41). The results show that BMI and medium term injuries
have a moderate negative correlation (-0.58). The results show that BMI and long
term injury have a very strong negative correlation (-1.03). The scatter graph results
show that body composition and short term injuries may have a link therefore
further research may be needed. In terms of medium and long term injuries the
scatter graph results show that body composition does not have a definite factor on
medium and long term injuries.

Contents: General
Page 2- My project aim. Page 19- Review 2/3
Page 3- Abstract of my project. Page 20- Review 3/3
Page 4- Contents page ( general) Page 21-Future recommendations 1/5
Page 5- Contents page (appendices) Page 22-Future recommendations 2/5
Page 6- Contents page ( figures and tables) Page 23-Future recommendations 3/5
Page 7- Acknowledgements. Page 24-Future recommendations 4/5
Page 8- Introduction to my project. Page 25-Future recommendations 5/5
Page 9- Literature review and references.
Page 10- Project hypothesis.
Page 11- Method.
Page 12- Date collection.
Page 13- Data analysis.
Page 14- Results.
Page 15- Discussion.
Page 16- Conclusion.
Page 17- Assessment criteria ( pages 19 -26)
Page 18-Review 1/3

Contents: Appendices
In this section you need to write a page by page
contents page (correctly numbered for pages 27-32)
Page 25 - Appendices title page
Page 26 - Appendix 1 ( link to my survey )
Page 27 - Appendix 2 ( link to body fat percentages)

Contents: Figures and Tables
Page 28 - Figures and tables title page.
Page 29- Figures and tables 1 ( correlation between ST rank and
BMI)
Page 30 - Figures and tables 2 ( correlation between MT and BMI)
Page 31 - Figures and tables 3 ( correlation between LT and BMI)
Page 32- Figures and tables 4 (raw data chart)
Page 33- Figures and tables 5 (BMI and ST rank data)
Page 34 - Figures and tables 6 ( BMI and MT rank data)
Page 35 - Figures and tables 7 (BMI and LT rank data)

Acknowledgements
I would firstly like to thank my teachers Paul Cox
and Mark Sambrook for the help they have given
me with my research project. Secondlyy I would
like to thank the Worthing college rugby team
for there participation in my research project.
Finally I would like to thank surveymonkey.com
for supplying a simple and effective way to
comprise a survey and analyse the data.

Introduction
To determine if a relationship exists between body composition and short, medium and long
term injury occurrence rates in male 16-19 year old participation level rugby players.
I chose this project because I was interested in the subject of injuries in rugby. I was always
wondering what are the factors that leads towards injury, especially in rugby because of the
nature of the sport. I myself have suffered with various short, medium and long term
injuries that have stopped me from playing, therefore I decided to see if there was a
correlation between body composition and injury rates in male 16-19 year old rugby
players. The reason I chose body composition as my variable was because of the variety of
body composition in my population (my college rugby team). I decided to use my college
rugby team as they are easily assessable and when comprising my primary data it can be
collected with ease.
I started my project on the 6th of march and finished on the 27th. On the 8th I made a survey
monkey called ‘ sport science injury survey‘. On the 19th I collection all this raw data, on the
20th I then analysed all this data and comprised it. On the 20th I followed on my primary
research and collected all the BMIs of the people who completed the survey.

Literature Review and References
My literature review can be found below.
https://worthingsportscience.wordpress.com/20
15/02/26/unit-5-literacy-review-alfie-dunk/

Project Hypothesis
Hypothesis 1- That there is a relationship between BMI and
injury rates in male 16-19 year old rugby players.
Hypothesis 2- That BMI has a significant relationship with short
term injury rates.

Method
Firstly I started by posting a online survey to my population, which I
comprised myself (appendix 1). I created and posted this on the 6th of
march and collected the data on the 19th.
On the 20th I collected and comprised this data. Following this on the
20th I also collected the BMIs of my population. On the 24th I used
excel to make a spreadsheet to compare the two variables against each
other.
On excel I ranked the BMIs and short, medium and long term goals, I
did this because I used the Spearmans rank to then rank my data.
(figures and tables 4)
I then went onto comparing BMI to short, medium and long term goals
separately( figures and tables 5,6 and 7). After this I was able to create
three scatter graphs (figures and tables 1,2 and 3). My write up for the
research project will be completed on the 27th.
P3: Collect and record / M2: Correctly analyse & describe techniques / D1: Correctly analyse & explain techniques

Data Collection
• My data is primary as I will comprise the sports injury survey
myself and I will collecting the height and weight of my
participants to calculate their BMI. My data is nominal data as
I will be categorising my participants into position and then
further into body composition groups. My data is quantitative
as I will be using a survey to get information from a large
group of people. My data is experimental and comparative as I
will be looking at the effects of an independent variable (body
composition) on a dependent variable (injury rates). I will also
be looking at the affects of position and BMI against injury
rates. My data is both lab and field based. I will be collecting
my participants height and weight in a lab based environment.
I will then be asking them to complete the survey in their own
time.

Data Analysis
For my research I had to analyse the data I collected myself from
my primary data. I used Microsoft excel to collate this raw data,
I used Spearmans rank in order to see if there was any
correlation between the BMIs I collected and the results from
my survey. I used this process to create three scatter graphs in
relation to BMI and short medium and long term injuries. The
benefits of a scatter graph is that is shows any relationship
between two variables for a set pair of data e.g. BMI and
medium term injuries have a strong negative correlation. A
scatter graph was suitable for my data as i was comparing a
independent variable against a dependent variables.

Results
The results show that BMI and short term injuries have a moderate
positive correlation (0.41) (Figures and tables 1 and 5) . The results
show that BMI and medium term injuries have a moderate negative
correlation (-0.58) (Figures and tables 2 and 6). The results show
that BMI and long term injury have a very strong negative
correlation (-1.03) (Figures and tables 3 and 7). My results found
differ from each dependent variable (short, medium and long term),
the main judgment from my results is that BMI has the most effect
on short term injuries.
• Hypothesis one is supported as my results generally show a
moderate correlation between body composition and injury rates
(figures and tables 1,2 and 3).
• Hypothesis two was supported as I found body composition and
short term injuries have the strongest relationship ( figures and
tables 1)

Discussion
All my results had moderate or greater correlation’s
whether they were positive or negative. My scatter graphs
only showed that there was more of a relationship
between body composition and short term injuries i
believe this was because short term injuries are more
common in rugby than medium and long. I believe
justifying my short ,medium and long term injuries results
is hard as when i collected the answers i was relying on
peoples memory, therefore my results may be unreliable
and thats why i found it hard to analyse the data.

Conclusion
My aim Is to look at if there a relationship between body composition and short, medium and
long term injury rates in rugby.
The first key trend from my literacy review is that all of my research found are about male
athletes, this can be seen as an disadvantage to my validity and reliability as I do not account
for body compositions link to injury in female athletes. This key trend is helpful to me though
as my study is only looking at males. 6 out of 10 of my research pieces looks at elite sport, they
are all longitudinal studies as well which is helpful to me as I can replicate the detail and
precision shown in these studies. 8 out of 10 of my pieces looked at rugby based research
which is good as my study looks at male 16-19 year old rugby players.
My results didn't really give me a indication for my first hypothesis as there was some
correlation between body composition and injury rates I think if I had a bigger sample my data
would be more reliable. My results did show that there is more of a correlation between body
composition and short term injuries therefore supporting hypotheses two and three. I believe
I found this because short term injuries were the most common within my population, I think
with a bigger population more medium and long term injuries would be found.

Review (1/3)
I believe project conclusions met project aims well as I met my aims and
hypotheses even though the results were not at strong as I thought.
My first aim was to Establish body composition of players in sample. I believe
this was achieved as I successfully collected the BMIs of all of my participants.
My second aim was to Classify injury type by players in sample and body
composition. I believe that this wasn’t really met as in my survey I asked
questions about duration more which links to my third aim more than aim
two. I asked a question about acute injury's but didn’t ask about other types of
injuries, I also didn’t really relate the degree of the injury in my research
project just the duration.
My third aim was to Record injury duration, injury type by players in sample
and body composition I believe that I met this aim as I successfully record
injury duration in my survey (appendix 1 ).
P5: Describe / M3: Explain / D2: Justify

Review (2/3)
I believe the strengths of my research project
was my ability to stick to deadlines and make
sure I planned myself enough time to do the
project. Another strength was the validity and
reliability of my BMI data as collected this myself
I also collect the height and weight twice to
ensure reliability.

Review (3/3)
I think my knowledge of excel was weak, therefore I
had to gain external help this put my slightly behind
on my time scale. I think another area of
improvement for my research project was that I
relied on peoples memory to get results of there
injury records (appendix 1) therefore I would think an
area for improvement would to make the study
longer and keep a injury record log for players and
games through out a season.

Future Recommendations (1/5)
If this project was to be repeated again I would recommend using
other ways to determine Body composition as BMI is not accurate for
rugby players as my average BMI in my study was 26.3 which is seen
as overweight and classed as unhealthy. I don't think this a true
representation of my participants as due to the nature of the
conditioning of rugby players they tend to be heavier.
When calculating BMI is doesn't take into account muscle mass and
other factors e.g. one of my athletes had a BMI of 25 which is seen
as over weight but only has a body fat percentage of 11% body fat
which is seen in the good category according to (appendix 2).
Therefore suggesting other means of calculating body composition
would give more valid and reliable results.
P4: Produce / P5: Describe / M3: Explain / D2: Justify

The benefits of measuring body composition in other
ways rather than BMI would be more reliability.
Hydrostatic Weighing would give better results and
make the project more valid in the future.The only
negative is that piece of equipment isn't very
accessible to the general public. This type of
measuring will give a true representation of body
composition.Hydrostatic Weighing is the most effect
way of measuring body composition.

If my research project was to be carried out again I
would recommend extending the length of the project
to a whole rugby season and keep a injury log because
in my project I was asking people to recall there injuries
over the season this is unreliable as peoples memory
can sometimes not recall all the information or the
wrong information therefore when using a survey and
recording injury records the data can be backed up with
the injury log, this would make the project more
reliable.

If my project was to be repeated again I would
recommend making the population larger as the
more participants would make the results more
reliable and valid. If the population increased there
would be a wider range of people in my data the
more participants there are the more representative
of the population, gender, ethnicity, religion and age
can all effect the results and the more participants
the research has the more true the statistical analysis
is.

My final recommendation would to do the research
project on different participations as to fully determine if
body composition has a effect on injury records, this
would be benefit as it would make the project more
valid and reliable. I would also suggest doing research
with males and females as again this would give more
data therefore making a more reliable research project.

Appendix 1
https://www.surveymonkey.com/create/?sm=m
AYpHHxcKGLHDuRyZgP01jjRYpp3z56vJHHINjltxu
g%3d
This is a link to the survey I created.

Appendix 2
http://www.humankinetics.com/excerpts/excer
pts/normal-ranges-of-body-weight-and-body-fat

Research Project Figures
and Tables

Figures and Tables 1
This shows the relationship between ST rank and BMI

This shows the relationship between MT rank and BMI.

This shows the relationship between LT rank and BMI.

This shows my initial raw data and ranking.

This shows my Spearmans rank for ST rank and BMI.

Figures and tables 6
This shows my Spearmans rank for MT rank and BMI.
34

Figures and tables 7
This shows my Spearmans rank for LT rank and BMI.
35

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