The evolution of swimming science research: Content analysis of the “Biomechanics and Medicine in Swimming” Proceedings Books from 1971 to 2006
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abstract
Swimming seems to be one of the
sports more studied .
More than one decade ago, Clarys
(1996) made an content analysis of
the research about swimming. However,
in these last 13 years several
developments happened in the
aqua/c ac/vi/es. In the past swimming
research was dedicated almost
exclusively to compe//ve swimming.
Nowadays there are several other
aqua/c ac/vi/es being prac/ced in
swimming centers, such as, Aqua/c
exercises, Aqua/c Rehabilita/on, Infant
swimming, etc. Swimming research
is also dedicated to analyze
and understand all these aqua/c ac-
/vi/es. So, we hypothesized that data
reported by Clarys (1996) may be
out of date.
The aim of this study was to analyze the evolution of the swimming science research based on the content analysis of the “Biomechanics and Medicine in Swimming” Proceeding books series from 1971 to 2006. The content of all the 622 papers published in the Proceeding books of the Symposiums of Biomechanics and Medicine in Swimming were evaluated. Two main categories were defined: (i) The “Aquatic activity” studied in each paper analyzed (included the sub-categories Competitive swimming, Water Polo, Synchronized Swimming, Diving, Hydrotherapy, Infant Swim, Head-out Aquatic Exercises, Fin Swimming and others) and; (ii) The main “scientific area” (including the sub-categories Biomechanics, Psychology, Sociology, Pedagogy/Teaching, Biochemistry, Physiology, Thermoregulation, Hydrodynamics, Electromyography, Anthropometry, Equipments/Methodologies, Clinical Medicine/Traumatology and Interdisciplinary assessment) applied for the assessment. There was an increasing number of papers published within the period of time analyzed (ranging from 23 papers in 1971 to 145 manuscripts in 2006). Comparing the sub-categories related to “Aquatic activity” the one with more research done was clearly the “competitive swimming” (ranging from 78.8 % in 1971 to 100 % in 1996). In the last decade there is a slight but increasing interest in “head-out aquatic exercises” (e.g., being the second most studied aquatic activity in 2006 with 6.9 %). Analyzing the main “scientific area” of study, “Biomechanics” was the most often assessed area (ranging from 27.3 % in 1988 to 60 % in 1979), followed by the “Physiology”. Since 2003 an increasing trend in “interdisciplinary assessment” manuscripts was verified (e.g., 9.7 % in 2003 and 21.4 % in 2006, shifting from the third to second area of interest).
