Investigation of the Exercise Dependence of Athletes Doing Kickboxing, Taekwondo, and Muay Thai

Abstract

Debates about the conditions in which the frequency and intensity principles of regular exercise, depending on the fact that a sports background can be accepted as extremism, are still a controversial topic. The purpose of this research was to investigate the exercise dependence of athletes who practice Kickboxing, Taekwondo, and Muay Thai. The study included 141 athletes, consisting of 87 men and 54 women. The Exercise Dependence Scale-21 (EDS-21), composed of 21 items developed by Hausenblas and Downs and adapted into the Turkish version by Yeltepe and İkizler, was applied to the athletes. As a result of the research, while athletes showed more sensitivity to the EDS (=71.41), this scale was also defined as symptomatic. It was found that five athletes (3.5%) were asymptomatic-nondependent, 117 athletes (83.0%) were symptomatic-nondependent, and 19 athletes (13.5%) were at risk for exercise dependence. It was determined that athletes were at risk for exercise dependence as follows: Eight athletes were doing Kickboxing, ten athletes were doing Taekwondo, and one athlete was doing Muay Thai. A significant difference was observed according to years of regular training and number of trainings per a day. Other variables presented no significant differences. It was possible to say that years of regular training could be effective in revealing exercise dependence.

Exercise Addiction in Athletes: a Systematic Review of the Literature

“…Levit et al (2018) found no difference in the frequency of EA between the sexes. This result is consistent with other studies that found no difference between male and female athletes in the risk of EA (Bingol & Bayansalduz, 2016;De la Vega et al, 2016;Orhan et al, 2019;Reche et al, 2018;Smith et al, 2010;Smith & Hale, 2004;Zeulner et al, 2016). However, two studies reported that female and male athletes might differ in their risk of EA.…”

“…The included studies examined participants from different sports. Nine of the included studies tested participants from mixed sports (Bingol & Bayansalduz, 2016;De La Vega et al, 2016;McNamara & McCabe, 2012;Müller et al, 2015;Orhan et al, 2019;Reche et al, 2018;Torstveit et al, 2019;Weinstein et al, 2015;Zeulner et al, 2016), three examined runners (Çetin et al, 2020;Smith et al, 2010;Szabo et al, 2013), one looked at elite bodybuilders (Smith & Hale, 2004), one focused on elite dancers (Akehurst & Oliver, 2014), and one examined triathletes (Youngman & Simpson, 2014). Two of the 17 studies did not report information on the type of sports the participants engaged in (Conesa et al, 2017;Levit et al, 2018).…”

“…The 17 studies also differed in the instruments used for measuring the risk of EA in athletes. The Exercise Dependence Survey (EDS; Hausenblas & Downs, 2002) was employed in eight studies (Akehurst & Oliver, 2014;Bingol & Bayansalduz, 2016;Conesa et al, 2017;Müller et al, 2015;Orhan et al, 2019;Reche et al, 2018;Smith et al, 2010;Torstveit et al, 2019), while the Exercise Addiction Inventory (EAI; Terry et al, 2004) was used in five studies (De La Vega et al, 2016;Levit et al, 2018;Szabo et al, 2013;Youngman & Simpson, 2014;Zeulner et al, 2016). The other four studies adopted the Exercise Dependence and Athletes Scale (EDEAS; McNamara & McCabe, 2012), the Bodybuilding Dependence Scale (BDS; Smith & Hale, 2004), the Exercise Addiction Scale (EAS; Tekkurşun Demir et al, 2018) used in the study by Çetin et al (2020), and the Compulsive Exercise Scale (CES; Tuttle, 1992) which was used by Weinstein et al (2015).…”

“…The studies also differed in their analysis strategies, as eight studies compared the risk of EA in athletes to recreational exercisers (De La Vega et al, 2016;Levit et al, 2018;Müller et al, 2015;Smith & Hale, 2004;Smith et al, 2010;Szabo et al, 2013;Weinstein et al, 2015;Zeulner et al, 2016). The remaining studies did not use a non-athlete comparison group and only focused on the assessment of the risk of EA in athletes or athlete subgroups (Akehurst & Oliver, 2014;Bingol & Bayansalduz, 2016;Çetin et al, 2020;Conesa et al, 2017;McNamara & McCabe, 2012;Orhan et al, 2019;Reche et al, 2018;Torstveit et al, 2019;Youngman & Simpson, 2014).…”

Analysis of interrelations of psychophysiological and hysiological indicators of martial arts athletes

“…Considering the heart rate at rest and its maximum value as the reaction indicator to competitive load in martial arts is offered [5]. The importance of the cardiovascular system parameters in kickboxing athletes state monitoring is confirmed [6]. Functional tests with the standardized loads estimate the subjects' optimum adaptation opportunities.…”