Promoting Interpersonal Relationships through Elbow Tag, a Traditional Sporting Game. A Multidimensional Approach

Abstract

The aim of this research was to study from a multidimensional point of view (decisional, relational and energetic) the interpersonal relationships established by girls and boys in the traditional sport game of Elbow Tag. Scientific evidence has shown that Traditional Sport Games (TSG) trigger different effects on male and female genders in relation to emotional experiences, decision-making, conflicts and motor relationships. Despite the fact that these dimensions are intertwined, there are hardly any studies that interpret motor behaviors holistically, i.e., taking a multidimensional (360°) view of these dimensions. For this study, a quasi-experimental design was used and a type III design was applied, inspired by the observational methodology N/P/M. A total of 147 university students participated (M = 19.6, SD = 2.3): 47 girls (31.97%) and 100 boys (68.02%). A mixed ‘ad hoc’ registration system was designed with acceptable margins of data quality. Cross-tabulations, classification trees and T-patterns analysis were applied. The results indicated that social interactions between girls and boys in a mixed group were unequal. This difference was mainly due to decision-making (sub-role variable), which has much greater predictive power than the energetic variables (MV and steps).