What are the physical factors in Higher PE?

The physical factors are the bodily and technical influences on performance, grouped into three areas: fitness, skills, and tactics or composition. Fitness is the body's capacity to meet the demands of the activity, including physical components such as endurance, strength, speed and flexibility, and skill-related components such as agility, balance, coordination, reaction time and power. Skills are the range and quality of techniques a performer can execute and how reliably. Tactics are the plans used to outwit an opponent in games, and composition is the structure of a performance activity such as gymnastics or dance.

What is the difference between physical and skill-related fitness?

Physical fitness components are the foundations of sustained, powerful, mobile movement: cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular endurance, strength, speed and flexibility. Skill-related fitness components link fitness to technique and fast play: agility, balance, coordination, reaction time and power. A games player needs both, but the balance depends on the activity, so a gymnast emphasises strength, flexibility and balance while a games player emphasises endurance, agility and power.

What are the stages of learning a skill?

Learning passes through three stages. At the cognitive stage a performer forms a mental picture of the skill, makes large and frequent errors, thinks through each part and relies on feedback and demonstration. At the associative stage they practise, errors reduce and the skill becomes more consistent. At the autonomous stage the skill is automatic and consistent, freeing attention for tactics and opponents, with self-correction. A performer can be at different stages for different skills, so the stage is described per skill.

How are tactics different from composition?

Tactics are the plans and decisions used to outwit an opponent in a game, such as formations, set plays, exploiting space and targeting an opponent's weakness. Composition is the equivalent in performance activities that have no direct opponent, such as gymnastics, dance and trampolining: the selection, order and linking of movements to create an effect and meet the required criteria. Both turn fitness and skills into an effective result and both balance risk against reward.

How is the physical factor developed and examined?

Fitness is developed through targeted training that matches the relevant components, skills through appropriate practice for their classification and stage of learning, and tactics or composition through rehearsal and analysis. In the question paper, the physical factor appears through describe and explain questions on the three areas, identifying the components or skills relevant to an activity, and explaining how strengths and weaknesses, or good and poor use of tactics, affect performance. Answers must be anchored in named activities.

ScotlandPhysical Education

SQA Higher PE Physical Factors: a complete overview of fitness, skills and tactics or composition

A deep-dive SQA Higher Physical Education guide to the physical factors impacting on performance. Covers the three areas of fitness, skills and tactics or composition, the fitness components, the stages of learning, how each is examined and how the physical factor is developed.

Generated by Claude Opus 4.815 min readHigherUpdated 2026-06-16

Reviewed by: AI editorial process; not yet individually human-reviewed

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What this factor actually demands
Fitness
Skills
Tactics and composition
How this factor is examined
Check your knowledge

What this factor actually demands

The physical factor is the most heavily examined of the four, with three distinct areas: fitness, skills, and tactics or composition. The examiners reward precise identification of the components or skills relevant to a named activity, and a developed cause and effect explanation of how strengths, weaknesses and the use of tactics affect performance.

This guide walks through all three areas, then sets out how they are examined. Each area is covered on a dot-point page with worked questions; this overview ties them together.

Fitness

Fitness is the body's capacity to meet the demands of an activity. Physical components are cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular endurance, strength, speed and flexibility; skill-related components are agility, balance, coordination, reaction time and power; mental fitness is the capacity to concentrate and stay composed over the full duration. The components needed depend on the activity, and a weakness often bites hardest in the closing stages.

Skills

Skills are the range and quality of techniques a performer can execute. A skilled performance is efficient, fluent, controlled, consistent, accurate and seemingly effortless. Skills are classified on continua (simple to complex, open to closed) and learned through three stages (cognitive, associative, autonomous). Skill quality and the stage of learning determine reliability under pressure.

Tactics and composition

Tactics are the plans used to outwit an opponent in games; composition is the structure of a performance activity such as gymnastics or dance. Both exploit weaknesses, maximise strengths and balance risk against reward, turning fitness and skills into a result.

How this factor is examined

A typical SQA profile for the physical factor:

Describe questions. Identifying the fitness components, skills or tactics relevant to a named activity.
Explain questions. Explaining how a strength or weakness in fitness or skills, or good and poor tactics, affects performance.
Stages and classification. Contrasting the stages of learning, or classifying a skill, and linking this to how it is practised.
Linked questions. Connecting the physical factor to the development process and to decision-making (using tactics in open play).

Check your knowledge

A mix of recall and explanation questions covering the factor. Attempt them, then check against the solutions.

Name the three areas of the physical factor. (2 marks)
Give two physical and two skill-related components of fitness. (2 marks)
Name the three stages of learning a skill. (2 marks)
Explain the difference between an open and a closed skill. (2 marks)
Explain one way good tactics can have a positive impact on performance. (2 marks)

Sources & how we know this

SQA Higher Physical Education Course Specification — SQA (2019)