Long‐term effects of Tai Chi: Cross‐sectional comparisons among the groups
MWS
Significant differences were observed among the groups on all six outcome measures (Table Cross‐sectional comparisons of physical function among Tai Chi‐naïve older adults, Tai Chi expert older adults and Tai Chi‐naïve younger adults.
Abbreviations: SLST‐EC, single‐legged stance time with eyes closed; TUG, Timed Up and Go; MWS, maximum walking speed.For Tai Chi naïve older adults.For Tai chi expert older adults.For Tai chi‐naïve younger adults.Only significant differences (Assumption of Homogeneity of variance was violated shown in the Levene's test. Therefore, raw data were converted by natural log transformation. Results were reported as geometric means ± standard deviation.Cross‐sectional group comparisons. Outcomes were continuous variables, presented as mean and error bars for each group. Group comparisons were tested by ANOVA, followed by post hoc tests using Bonferroni for pair‐wise comparisons. When an assumption of Homogeneity of variance was violated (SLST‐EC, grip strength, Timed Up and Go, and vertical jump), raw data were converted by natural log transformation. For Tai Chi‐naïve older adults, all outcome measures were from their baseline visit. All of the global tests were statistically significant, and the Exploratory analyses evaluated the effect of age and sex on physical function outcomes. We hypothesized that, within the range of 50–79 years of age, Tai Chi would attenuate age‐related decline in physical function. Specifically, we predicted that negative slopes characterizing the relationship between age and function would be less steep in the Tai Chi expert group as compared to the Tai Chi‐naïve group. This was not observed for most outcomes (Figure 