Poster Information
| Title | Sweet Harvest: An Exergame for Increasing Flexibility and Warming Up for Intense Exercise |
| Presenter(s) | Maybellin Burgos, Mykel Pendergrass, Andrea Nickel, Jamie Payton and Tiffany Barnes |
| Session | Conference Reception, Game Exhibition, and Poster Session |
| Time | Thursday, October 18, 7:00p-10:00p |
| Location | East Lansing Technology Innovation Center |
| Format | Poster Presentation |
| Description | In recent years, there have been significant increases in cases of obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, and numerous other health problems among the population of the United States. Research has shown that regular physical activity can serve as a preventative measure to address many of these health issues; however, most Americans still fall far short of the recommended amount of physical activity. Exercise games, or exergames, are a promising approach to motivate people to exercise; such games have the potential to be more engaging and entertaining than traditional exercise activities.
We have developed an exergame prototype, called Sweet Harvest, a Kinect-based game which aims to help people to increase flexibility and to warm up for a more intense exercise session; these activities are often ignored, which can potentially lead to injury. In order to immerse the user and to encourage repeated game play, Sweet Harvest incorporates a storyline in which the user must collect falling fruits and place them in a basket; in attempting to catch the fruit, the player performs dynamic and active stretching of the arms and legs. To keep the user engaged and to facilitate an effective stretch and warm-up routine, Sweet Harvest dynamically adapts the difficulty of the game, making it more or less challenging in response to the player's performance. A prototype is available for play, and a user study is planned. To evaluate the effectiveness of the game for increasing flexibility and as a warm-up, we will compare the results of standard flexibility tests and the heart rate of players before and after playing the game; we expect to see a measurable change between the beginning and final flexibility tests and an elevation in heart rate. |