Are standing desks actually bad for you?
Study: Being on your feet for extended periods problematic
You might want to sit down before you hear the latest research on standing desks.
We all know sitting at a desk for too long can lead to long-term health problems, which has led many workers to switch to standing desks to lose weight, reduce back pain and generally stay more
alert. Sitting is the new smoking, right?
Unfortunately, a study recently published in the journal Ergonomics suggests that standing at a desk for a long period of time can create “discomfort and deteriorating mental reactiveness,” as the Washington Post reports. That’s bad for your health and your productivity.
Conducted by Curtin University in Australia, this is only a small, 20-person study, but if you take into account other previous research, there is a growing body of evidence that suggests standing too long can lead to back pain and the swelling of veins. As Newsweek reported, a 12year study of more than 7,000 office workers in the American Journal of Epidemiology found people who often stood at work were nearly twice as likely to develop heart disease as opposed to those that sat more often.
“The bottom line is that this expansion has been driven more by commercial reasons than scientific evidence,” said Alan Taylor, a physiotherapy expert at Nottingham University noted in the Post. “But the evidence is catching up and it’s showing there are some drawbacks.”
Taylor maintains that office workers should rely less on standing desks for their
well-being and instead focus on moving more often.
So, by all means, take a seat — and then try and take a walk.