Sitting All Day: Worse For You Than You Might Think

Explanationless science always gets into difficulties.

That said, I suspect that watching TV all day everyday would kill a person, eventually, because thinking without a break depletes the CNS of resources which would otherwise be used to regulate the body.

(Note: TV watching is a kind of externally driven thinking. More draining than thinking about the show would be the guilt thoughts caused by watching TV all day given that our culture believes (a) that watching too much TV is bad, and (b) that productive work is good.)

However, it's misleading to claim that sitting around all day is unhealthy. For instance, you won't get a heart attack if you are a Buddhist Monk sitting in meditation.

Also, moving around all day would kill people, eventually, by similar means and for similar reasons to TV watching. For example:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_Plague_of_1518

I'm another data point. Built my own standing desk and bought a drafting chair; I frequently stand most of the day, and it's improved my posture markedly.

I'd gone through a series of various expensive "ergo" chairs, and yet I would get a feeling of suffocation when sitting for too long. Now I can work for extended periods without the need to "get up and walk around."

And when particularly good music comes on the radio, I can dance to it during compiles. Yes, I work in an office where no one can see me. ;)

I have tried different chairs and postures without success. I teach yoga classes a few times a week and I see a lot of people (age 40+) showing similar symptoms: numb legs and arms, lower back pain. I believe an additional problem is that if you sit the whole day the muscles at the front side of your body get too short and the back side too long. So when you finally exercise this imbalance may cause even more problems.

I see "health scare meme" as a potentially dangerous meme in and of itself.

YES, the media can exaggerate the result of a single study and people will overreact to it (see: "margarine is healthier than butter," then more recently the reverse). In this particular study, the results may not be conclusive enough to act on; that aside, there ARE other health studies that have been successfully repeated (for example, the negative effects of hydrogenated oils/trans fats) that are also frequently dismissed by a media-weary public as yet another "health scare meme".

The "trans fats are bad" idea is finally going mainstream, but IMO it took years longer than it should have because of the media's tendency to jump at the first study showing a surprising result, and thus inuring the public to "bad health news," which a majority of people then proceed to ignore (and a minority jump onto the latest bandwagon).

In the case of standing vs. sitting, I saw this study months ago, and at the same time I started feeling uncomfortable sitting for long periods, and the combination caused me to build a standing desk. I'm now standing most days, and for me it's a great improvement -- YMMV, and not saying it proves anything but possibly that my circulation wasn't so great.

Regardless, I'm on this particular bandwagon, and it improves my QoL, so I'm staying, regardless of the scorn people may have for health fads. ;)

Am I the only one in hacker news that does not sit down at all at work? We are bipeds designed for standing on our two foot and moving from a while.

I have lifeguards friends that talked to me about the change in the body shape they have seen over the years, especially women as the spend more and more time sit down in front of the computer.

So I decided to change, it took months to get used to it as all musculature had been trained by years to sit down as since school time and on kids-adults are forced to sit down.

I had worked as a teacher for kids and is really really interesting HOW THEY OPPOSE AND RESIST sitting in the same place without moving. One day we had strong hail storm out there and the principal-director forced us to keep kids inside on playtime. Other teachers forced kids to sit on their chairs so they could count and control them easily. The next class I had the kids almost exploding under their desk with painful anxiety. So I let them stand up and move as they wish while I was giving my class!!. It worked wonderfully.

If I sit I use a Bar Stool, but I'm standing up 90% of the time. My computer is in front of my eyes. I love it.

If you try it, CAUTION, it will take time for your musculature to adapt, at least a month.