Table 1 Eligibility criteria
Category | Inclusion criteria | Exclusion criteria |
|---|---|---|
Participants | Healthy individuals, without restrictions on their fitness level, sex, or age | Studies that included participants with health issues (e.g., upper-body injuries, recent surgery) that prevent them from either performing exercise or doing it at maximum intensity |
Interventions | UBPT programs with a minimal duration of ≥ 3 weeks [33, 39] which commonly utilize a pre-stretch or countermovement stressing the stretch–shortening cycle | Interventions not including UBPT; or those including UBPT but in combination with other type of exercises with an augmented representation (i.e., > 50% of total number of exercises derived from non-UBPT drills) so that the independent effect of UBPT was precluded) |
Comparators | Active (i.e., individuals regularly involved in training schedules), specific-active, or non-active control groups | Absence of a control group |
Outcomes | Studies that reported health- (e.g., muscle mass) and skill-related (e.g., power; joint angle-velocity during shot-put) physical fitness outcomes before and after UBPT | Studies that did not report baseline and/or follow-up data |
Study design | Randomized controlled and non-randomized controlled trials | Studies including only one group, case studies, observational studies |