THE RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY OF THE 20-METER SHUTTLE TEST IN AMERICAN STUDENTS 12 TO 15 YEARS OLD

The purpose of this study was threefold: to determine (a) the test-retest reliability of the 20-m shuttle test (20 MST) (number of laps), (b) the concurrent validity of the 20 MST (number of laps), and (c) the validity of the prediction equation for VO2max developed by Leger, Mercier, Gadoury, and Lambert (1988) on Canadian children for use with American children 12-15 years old. An intraclass coefficient of . 93 was obtained on 20 students (12 males; R = .91 and 8 females; R = .87) who completed the lest twice, 1 week apart (M(T1) = 4 7.80 +/- 20.29 vs. M(T2) = 50.55 +/- 22.39 laps; p greater-than-or-equal-to .13). VO2peak was obtained by a treadmill test to volitional fatigue on 48 subjects. The number of laps run correlated significantly with VO2peak in males (n = 22; r = 65; F [1, 20] = 14.30 p less-than-or-equal-to . 001), females (n = 26; r = .51; F [1, 24] = 8.34; p less-than-or-equal-to . 01), and males and females = (r = .69; F [1, 46] = 42.54, p less-than-or-equal-to . 001). When the measured VO2peak (M = 49.97 +/- 7.59 ml.kg-1. min-1) was compared with the estimated VO2max (M = 48.72 +/- 5.72 ml.kg-1. min-) predicted from age and maximal speed of the 20 MST (Leger et al., 1988) no significant difference was found, t (4 7) = -1. 631; p greater-than-or-equal-to . 11, between the means; the r was. 72 and SEE was 5.26 ml.kg-1, min-1. It was concluded that (a) the 20 MST is a reliable test, (b) the 20 MST is as valid a test of cardiorespiratory endurance as other distance run tests for this age group, and (c) the Leger et al. (1988) prediction equation for VO2max is valid for 12-15- year-old American youths.