Mia Peric

• Associate professor at University of Split

Volleyball referees, as athletes and staff members, are exposed to different stress levels which can be determined by measuring pre- and post-match levels of salivary cortisol (C) and alpha-amylase (AA). This study aimed to determine the dynamics of stress biomarkers in referees during official volleyball matches and the connection to the roles or...

Stress is defined as a reaction of the body to any given stressor, external or internal. These stressors are common among participants in sports. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the dynamics of two stress biomarkers during an official cliff diving competition. The sample of participants included six professional cliff divers (three females...

Rowing races require extreme physical and psychological effort from every athlete. This study aimed to determine the dynamics of the salivary cortisol and alpha-amylase, as well as blood lactate throughout the specific load represented by a 6 km rowing race, conducted on a rowing ergometer. The sample consisted of 11 junior and senior rowers from H...

BACKGROUND: Athletes during team sports matches go through high amounts of psychological and physiological stress that is set upon them. This stress is usually caused by external and internal factors. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the endocrine reactivity of cortisol and alpha-amylase during a lacrosse game. METHODS: The participants i...

BACKGROUND: Freediving is defined as an activity where athletes repetitively dive and are exposed to long efforts with limited oxygen consumption. Therefore, anaerobic features are expected to be an important facet of diving performance. This study aimed to investigate differences in anaerobic capacity and local muscle oxygenation in spearfisherman...

Stress was previously defined as a response to any demand for change. These demands are noticeable during sport events, not only in athletes but also in coaches. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the influence of slow-paced breathing (SPB) on acute stress to handball coaches during official matches. One professional handball coach, aged 37 (...

A variety of loads are placed upon an athlete in team sports (e.g., training, match, or competitions). However, the volume of the training load plays an important role in match success. Therefore, the aim of this study was to compare the differences in biomarker dynamics during the match and during training, and to evaluate if such training represe...

This study aimed to examine position-specific differences in running performance (RP) according to the match outcome in UEFA Champions League (UCL). The players’ RPs (n=244) were collected during UCL group stage matches (n=20) in the 2020/21 season using semiautomatic optical system InStat Fitness, and classified according to their playing position...

Background and Objectives: Cardiovascular health status (CVHS) is an important determinant of health, while it is theorized that health literacy (HL) and physical literacy (PL) could be directly related to CVHS. The aim of this study was to evaluate gender-specific associations between PL and HL and indices of CVHS in adolescence. Materials and Met...

Health literacy (HL) and physical literacy (PL) are concepts responsible for achieving and maintaining positive health behaviors. This study aimed to investigate gender-specific associations: (i) between PL and HL; and (ii) among HL, PL, and body composition. We observed 253 students attending health-area high schools from southern Croatia (181 gir...

The positive effects of dance on health indices in youth are widely recognized, but participation in dance is accompanied with a certain risk of injury. This prospective study aimed to investigate injury occurrence and to evaluate the possible influences of specific predictors on the occurrence of musculoskeletal problems and injuries in adolescent...

Professional ballet is a highly challenging art, but studies have rarely examined factors associated with injury status in ballet professionals. This study aimed to prospectively examine gender-specific correlates of injury occurrence and time-off from injury in professional ballet dancers over a one-year period. The participants were 99 profession...

U ovom radu prikazano je kakav utjecaj ima primjena vježbi iz joge na fleksibilnost zdjeličnog pojasa i stražnjih loža kod djece predškolskog i školskog uzrasta. Istraživanje je provedeno na dvije skupine djece, 10 predškolaca i 14 školaraca. Istraživanje je napravljeno s ciljem uvođenja relativno novih vježbi i sustava treninga fleksibilnosti u ta...

Vitamin D deficiency is a globally important problem, particularly in children, but there is a lack of information regarding this deficiency in preschool children from southeastern Europe. This study aimed to establish the levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) and associations of gender, time spent outdoors, physical activity (PA), and body mass...

Agility is an important quality in tennis, yet there is an evident lack of studies focussing on the applicability of tennis-specific agility performances and comparing them to equivalent non-specific agility performances. The aim of this study was to evaluate the reliability and factorial validity of three tests of pre-planned agility, performed in...

Abstract. The main purpose of this research was to determine to what extent some of the characteristics of female athletes in synchronized swimming hypothetically explains their results and offers predictions. The research was conducted on 30synchronized swimmers, height 165.49±3.57cm and body weight of 53±4.23kg who regularly train and compete in...

Background: Substance use and misuse (SUM), eating disorders (ED) and consequent amenorrhea (AM) occur frequently in professional ballet dancing. The objective of this study has been to explore the prevalence and association between ED, AM and SUM in ballet. Material and Methods: The sample comprised 21 ballet dancers, 23.1±4.5 years old, members o...

Background: Adolescent alcohol consumption is a significant public-health problem, although there is a lack of studies investigating this issue in Kosovo. Objectives: The aim of this investigation was to examine the prevalence of alcohol drinking, and the factors associated with harmful drinking (HD) in Kosovar 17-18 years old adolescents. Meth...

Objective: The community of residence (ie, urban vs rural) is one of the known factors of influence on substance use and misuse (SUM). The aim of this study was to explore the community-specific prevalence of SUM and the associations that exist between scholastic, familial, sports and sociodemographic factors with SUM in adolescents from Bosnia an...

There is an evident lack of studies examining the factors associated with reactive agility performances. The aim of this study was to evaluate the association between anthropometrics, body composition, jumping capacity, reactive strength, and balance with a stop-and-go change of direction speed (CODS) and reactive agility. The total sample comprise...

Aim. There is a substantial lack of research investigating the factors that should be targeted in doping prevention. The aim of this study was to evaluate factors associated to potential doping behaviour in college-level-athletes, students of sport-science. Methods. The sample comprised of 60 female and 129 male athletes from Croatia and Slovenia....

Objective: There is a substantial lack of research investigating the prevention of doping behaviours. Methods: In this investigation we studied gender-specific factors related to hesitation against doping behaviours in a sample of 60 female and 129 male college-age-athletes. Data were collected in spring 2014; a 99% response rate was achieved. We...

The main objective of this study was to evaluate the reliability and validity of a newly constructed reactive-agility test that can be used to define reactive-agility performance in sports that employ a repeated scenarios of "stop'n'go" agility. Measuring is done by original hardware based on the ATMEL microcontroller AT89C51RE2. A total of 36 coll...

Aim: This study examined the applicability of sport-specific fitness tests (SSTs), anthropometrics, and respiratory parameters in predicting competitive results among pubescent synchronized swimmers. Methods: A total of 25 synchronized swimmers (16-17 years; 166.2 ± 5.4 cm; and 58.4 ± 4.3 kg) volunteered for this study. The independent variables...

Although nutrition and doping are important factors in sports, neither is often investigated in synchronized swimming (Syn-chro). This study aimed to define and compare Synchro athletes and their coaches on their knowledge of sports nutrition (KSN) and knowledge of doping (KD); and to study factors related to KSN and KD in each of these groups. Add...

Although nutrition and doping are important factors in sports, neither is often investigated in synchronized swimming (Synchro). This study aimed to define and compare Synchro athletes and their coaches on their knowledge of sports nutrition (KSN) and knowledge of doping (KD); and to study factors related to KSN and KD in each of these groups. Addi...

The training effects of contemporary aerobics programmes (hi lo, dance aerobics, step aerobics, aqua aerobics etc.) have been frequently investigated. However, we found no recent paper which reviewed aerobic programmes with regard to their training effectiveness, characteristics of the subjects involved, variables of interest and experimental desig...

Predictors of sport-performance in synchronised swimming (Synchro) are rarely investigated. In this study we studied the applicability of sport-specific and anthropometric predictors of Synchro performance for young athletes (all females, 15–17 years of age, 6–8 years of experience in Synchro). Initially, four sport-specific tests (determining char...

The Reliability, Validity and Applicability of Two Sport-Specific Power Tests in Synchronized Swimming Sport-specific tests are rarely investigated in synchronized swimming (synchro). The aim of this research was to study the reliability and the validity of two sport-specific tests that are based on synchro elements, namely, the Barracuda thrust ("...

Pulmonary function (PF) is particularly important in synchronized swimming, considering the characteristics of this sport. However, the sanitizing agents (chlorine) used in pools can have a possible negative influence on the PF parameters. In this study, we observed 24 swimmers (all women, 14 to 16 years of age) and measured their PF and competitiv...

This study investigated substance use and misuse among 16 female and 9 male Croatian ballet professionals in 2008 using an original questionnaire. We analyzed social, personal, activity- and training-related, and educational factors, and criteria such as: binge alcohol drinking, cigarette smoking, appetite suppressant consumption, analgesic use, an...

There have been few studies comparing substance use and misuse (SU&M) in different performing arts forms. Herein, we identified and compared SU&M in women studying an art (ballet, n = 21), a non-Olympic sport (dance sport, n = 25), and an Olympic sport (synchronized swimming, n = 23). The sample of variables comprised general, educational, and spor...