ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This study analyzed the muscle activity changes induced by motions of reaching forward and chest expansion that were examined from the bilateral muscles with rectus abdominis, external oblique, multifidus, and longissimus thoracic using Pilates cadillac instrument. METHODS: Nine young adult women, who have no musculoskeletal disorder and any of chronic diseases, were participated. Surface electromyography system was used for recording of all signals produced by muscles, and then normalized as percentage of maximum voluntary isometric contraction (%MVIC). The paired t-test and repeated measures of analysis of variance was performed. RESULTS: Reaching-forward motion showed a higher muscle activity from non-dominant external oblique muscle than that of the chest-expansion motion. During both reaching-forward motion and chest-expansion motion, MVIC values collected from dominant side of external oblique muscle were shown a significantly lower than the values obtained from non-dominant side (p < 0.05). Conversely, %MVIC values in external oblique muscle collected from dominant side showed a significantly higher than the values obtained from non-dominant side of the same oblique muscle (p < 0.05). Reaching-forward motion was caused a higher %MVIC on non-dominant external oblique muscle than that of the chest-expansion motion (p < 0.05). Regardless of dominant or non-dominant sides, external oblique muscle was shown the highest activation rate of all the other muscles during reaching forward action, and longissimus thoracic muscle was shown the highest activation rate of all the other muscles during chest expansion action. CONCLUSION: Reaching-forward motion is suitable for activating an external oblique muscle, and chest-expansion motion is an effective enough in activating of longissimus thoracic muscle.