## 4 Discussion
The low-fit group maintained the core affect without significant change in the fourth quadrant, including their pre-exercise state and throughout the entire section. They then moved to the first quadrant immediately after exercise, showing increased positive affect and arousal. These findings suggest that despite the shared feelings of elevated mood and arousal individuals feel after exercise, the affective experience during exercise may differ depending on participants' fitness level. In addition, high-fit individuals seem to experience a greater increase in affect throughout the exercise than low-fit individuals. For quick and repeated measurement of changes in affect and arousal in real-time during exercise, a single item 11-point Likert scale (-5 to +5) was used. In doing so, we only assessed the affective experience during exercise within the extent of high and low levels of valence (displeasure to pleasure) and arousal (deactivation to activation). To supplement this, the participants were asked to answer a 20-item PANAS-X to measure positive and negative affect before and after exercise. The results of the PANAS-X pre- and post-exercise and the results of affect (valence) measured by the FS pre-, during-, and post-exercise were not consistent. Figure 5 shows that the high-fit and low-fit groups did not differ in positive affect before exercise. However, the positive affect after exercise was higher in the high-fit group relative to the low-fit group. Despite no statistical difference between groups as a function of time (pre and post-exercise), positive affect increased after exercise in the high-fit group and decreased in the low-fit group. This tendency made the difference in positive affect between groups significant after exercise. However, we found no significant difference in negative affect according to the fitness level or time in this study, which suggests that participation in a group dance program such as Zumba fitness may not lead to meaningful changes in negative affect. These results are consistent with the study of [PERSON] et al. [28], where negative affect measured before and after a Zumba fitness program was not different regardless of exercise intensity. This finding implies that improved positive affect rather than decreased negative affect provides the affective benefit in dance-based exercise. Interestingly, the results of this study regarding pre and post-exercise affect are somewhat contradictory to previous studies that investigated affective changes following exercise. The existing studies primarily focused on exploring affective changes according to exercise intensity. Many of them reported that moderate-intensity exercise could expect a greater affective improvement than exercises at a too low or high intensity [44]. In a recent study by [PERSON] et al. [28] which investigated affective changes before, during, and after exercise of Zumba fitness depending on exercise intensity, moderate-intensity (72.19% HRmax) exercise led to a greater increase in positive affect than low-intensity (62.48% HRmax)exercise. [PERSON] et al. also found that affect and arousal during exercise at moderate intensity gradually increased. In contrast, low-intensity exercise only led to a temporary increase in positive affect at the beginning of the exercise, without additional improvement during and after the exercise. Therefore, the researchers suggested that the affective benefit of exercise is greater when performed at moderate intensity than at low intensity. Our results contradict previous studies: we found that low-intensity (i.e., 57% HRmax in high-fit group) exercise provides more significant affective benefit than moderate-intensity (i.e., 66% HRmax in low-fit group) exercise. However, the characteristics of the physical fitness variable need to be considered which influence the exercise-affect relationship. Physical fitness is about moving the body to carry out a healthy and active daily life, which is the foundation of normal life [45]. Regular exercise enhances fitness [11].