Leisure-time physical activity as a determinant of self-perceived fitness

This paper examined the extent to which a reliable measure of leisure-time physical activity is predictive of self-perceived fitness among 40 British university students (mean age = 20.6 yr.). Spearman's rank-order correlations indicated that self-perceived fitness, on an ordinal scale of 1 through 5, was positively correlated 0.48 with Total activity score and 0.54 with one of its subfractions, Very Hard activity. An additional association of 0.52 with an estimate of cardiorespiratory endurance capacity meant that 35.4% of the variation in self-perceived fitness was accounted for by leisure-time physical activity and fitness variables (R = 0.60). These findings provide support that notions of perceived fitness are not inaccurate and are influenced by the amount and types of leisure-time physical activity undertaken.