Study says Wii fit may not help families get fit

by Sylvie Barak on 18 December 2009, 11:07

Tags: Wii fit, Nintendo (TYO:7974), Wii, Sports

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Wii can't help lazy people

In what may just be one of the more frivolous studies undertaken this year, a University of Mississippi research paper asserts that using a Wii Fit might not actually make you especially fit at all.

UM associate professor of health and exercise science Scott Owens used university funds to buy eight Nintendo Wiis, which he then proceeded to deliver to eight families for use over a six month period. Yes, just eight.

Whilst Owens did apparently find that "children did display significant increases in aerobic fitness after three months with the Wii Fit," overall, "three months of home Wii Fit use produced no significant changes in daily physical activity, muscular fitness, flexibility, balance or body composition for families as a whole." Typical, oldies dragging the family down, tsk.

Owens also found that despite having generously doled out the free consoles, daily Wii Fit use per household "declined by 82 per cent, from 22 minutes per day during the first six weeks to four minutes per day during the second six weeks."

This led Owens to conclude that "the Wii Fit had little impact on daily fitness and that that modest amounts of daily Wii Fit use may have provided insufficient stimulus for fitness changes." Oh, ok, so it was the families' laziness and not the Wii's fault then?

Despite the fact that the survey didn't yield any particularly useful results, the UM School of Applied Sciences remains convinced that buying the consoles with university funds was completely justifiable.

"The school supplied the equipment for the study because it is important faculty research that seeks applied solutions to real-world problems," said Marie Barnard, applied sciences assistant dean.

Riiiiiight.



HEXUS Forums :: 24 Comments

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the whole bloody problem with it is the WAITING!! i'm not gonna spend 45 minutes waiting to do a bit of exercise then get bored of their terrible droney voices.
HEXUS
especially if you don't use it

it took a university to figure that out?
we have a wii fit and my Girlfriend loves it = im happy
To be fair, you can't argue with that logic.

I would buy a Wii fit myself for my girlfriend to use, but the ceiling is only 5 feet where the Wii is so I think it could be challenging. Even Wii tennis is a bit of a stretch.
snootyjim
To be fair, you can't argue with that logic.

I would buy a Wii fit myself for my girlfriend to use, but the ceiling is only 5 feet where the Wii is so I think it could be challenging. Even Wii tennis is a bit of a stretch.
Surely it's not a stretch and that's the problem!
Steve
Surely it's not a stretch and that's the problem!

How did I know that was going to happen :p

Maybe I should've said “It's usually smashing!”