Stand Up Against Sitting Down!

“Stand up while you read this.” That’s the headline on a The New York Times article about the negative effects of sitting down all day long. Even those that exercise regularly are still doing damage to themselves by staying seated in a chair all day long. According to the article, people who sit in front of the television for more than three hours each day verses those who exercise are as fat as those who don’t: sitting a lot appears to offset some of the benefits of jogging.

Sitting requires almost no energy. Even standing in one place requires you to tense your leg muscles and use the muscles of your back and shoulders, so at least you are burning some energy. Several strands of evidence suggest that there’s a “physiology of inactivity”: that when you spend long periods sitting, your body actually does things that are bad for you.

A study of people who sit for many hours found that those who took frequent small breaks — standing up to stretch or walk down the corridor — had smaller waists and better profiles for sugar and fat metabolism than those who did their sitting in long, uninterrupted chunks.

The article even makes mention to radical alternatives to sitting down all day like replacing your desk with a “stand-up desk” or even adding a treadmill. How about replacing the couch with a rocking chair, even that little bit of motion takes energy.

We encourage you to take a look at the New York Times article which has some very interesting information about the effects of sitting down all day.

Tags: Back Pain, Medical Questions