
'The chair is out to kill us'. Studies point to the health risks of sitting - ronnier
http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-dont-sit-20130525,0,3673157.story
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csallen
Is there a study that doesn't assume correlation == causation? Yes, lots of
people who are generally unhealthy also have jobs that require sitting for
hours at a time. But what does that mean for someone who lives an otherwise
healthy lifestyle?

Let's say person A burns 1000 calories a day at his job, and only sits for a
few hours when he goes home. Person B burns 1000 calories in his off time, but
sits at work for 8 hours. Is person B still more likely to suffer health
defects and die early? If so, _why_?

~~~
nwhitehead
All the studies so far indicate sitting (or other forms of inactivity) are bad
no matter how much you exercise at other times.

The best natural experiment was the London bus driver study which showed huge
differences in heart problems between drivers (sitting all day) and conductors
(standing all day). Both were drawn from the same pool of employees and
randomly assigned roles, so the experiment was naturally controlled for
everything except the difference in behavior.

There were some other differences such as drivers having a more stressful job
and conductors having more social interactions which might explain some of the
differences in outcomes apart from the sitting/moving difference. But in any
case, sitting for hours a day at a stressful job with minimal social
interaction is incredibly bad for your health. Programmers take note!

~~~
csallen
Interesting. It would be a bit more legitimate of if the difference was
between standing and sitting bus drivers (assuming there was some way to stand
and drive a bus).

Or, straight to the point, if there was a study involving standing programmer
and sitting programmers... preferably one in which the roles were randomized,
because I'd suspect that programmers who've already chosen to stand while they
work are probably a more health-conscious lot as it is.

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trafficlight
I just opened a coworking space a couple of months ago. It used to be an auto
shop, so we tried to maintain that feel. My favorite part is the old hydraulic
lift that we converted into a standing height desk.

[https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-
ash3/579181_296764684...](https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-
ash3/579181_2967646845592_239634524_n.jpg)

~~~
pgrote
What surface are you using? Can the lift still move up and down?

~~~
dj2stein9
I would've been tempted to modify the lift such that the entire desk could
retract into the floor, leaving an open area when it's needed.

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tokenadult
One reason I live where I do is so that I am within a mile (which, for me, is
walking distance) of much of my shopping and from the county library branch.
Being able to walk to do errands reduces driving, which reduces sitting, and
increases exercise.

At my computer keyboard, where I live continually, I sit on an exercise ball
rather than any kind of chair. Even at that, I should probably get up and move
around more, but at least I have the routine of a homeschooling parent of
three children still living at home to provide interruptions and occasions to
change my posture. It's hard to optimize for everything, but so far I've
avoided the worst of the health symptoms mentioned in the article kindly
submitted here, even though I am already of middle age.

~~~
aaron695
My understanding is walking rather than than driving for instance is NOT a
solution to this specific issue (It's great for other reasons).

It is in part, as in you might sit for 13 hours a day so 30 mins less sitting
makes you 3% better off but really it's not the solution. Similarly to getting
up and walking around, if you do it 5 mins ever hour that's 4% better off.

My understanding is these studies are saying to make change you need to stop
sitting for large periods of time (ie reduce by 50+%), if you don't want to
die/become crippled early.

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walshemj
This sounds very like Stanley Green
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Green)a> very well known english
eccentric who used to walk up and down oxford street with a sandwich board
that read “Less Lust, By Less Protein: Meat Fish Bird; Egg Cheese; Peas Beans;
Nuts. And Sitting,"

I believe one of his thesis was that to much sitting led to horrors like the
Rolling stones and the whole permissive 60’s

He was a well known sight to any one who worked in central London pre 1993
when he died.

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mdip
I don't entirely know what to do with this story.

"Sitting" (or more specifically, the way I "sit" all day) resulted in me
having pretty awful back pain that required treatment earlier this year. I had
bad posture spent 4-5 hours stationary writing code. Having a standing desk
would have probably helped me to take more breaks and move around. A little
app called Kitchen Timer, combined with a very mild set of
stretching/exercises works for me now. I don't have heart problems. My
"inputs" match my "outputs". I've maintained my weight within 5 pounds for 10
years.

The thing that bothers me about this article is the way it's presented. It's
designed to scare ... and I know first hand that it works. Growing up, my mom
wouldn't let me stand anywhere near the microwave because of something she saw
on 20/20. We heated up food the same way we lit fireworks ("strike" and
"run!") When I purchased my first cell phone she panicked about the RADIATION
and warned me against using it regularly (Chernobyl === Magnetron to her). My
mom watched 20/20 _all the time!_

I have no interest in a standing desk. I work well sitting down, and the timer
gives me a nice reminder to stretch out which I can choose to ignore if I'm
focused on something I can't pull away from. I smoked as a teenager ... maybe
I'm being naive and using anec-data, but my chair is no Marlboro.

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LowKarmaAccount
Standing desks can hurt you if you don't wear proper shoes and/or use some
kind of standing mat; regular desks can hurt you if your chair is unergonomic
(there was an article on HN about this two weeks ago.) In a similar vein, you
can develop RSI if you use an poorly designed keyboard, but that doesn't mean
typing will eventually give you RSI.

Hn discussion: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5719891>

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chipsy
Lately I've been using my phone to do a cycle of 15/5 minutes
sitting/standing, with standing time also being a break from the computer.
It's worked really well. The break time is not really an interruption; 5
minutes is enough for most small chores, and if I don't have any of those, I
can use it for mindfulness practice. Plus chopping it up gives me better
estimates about time usage and how much I can get out of any given work day -
after a certain point it becomes clear that I'm spending most of each cycle on
distractions, so I'll start adjusting my plan to match reality.

I could probably use Pomodoro or any similar cycle and also get good results,
I just happened to try this first.

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quaffapint
Too much of anything is bad for you. Too much sitting? Get up and move around.
Too much standing - take a load off. Too much sugar, too much caffeine. How's
this any different than the standard saying of "all in moderation".

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logn
Well, this article is rubbish and is pretty typical of crappy scientific
reporting.

However, I like thinking about ergonomics. Do many people here recline while
working? I've been working for a year now, laying back on a couch, feet up and
head on a pillow. It works well, but even before this I had carpal tunnel
which this doesn't help (it did for a while though). I've resorted to padded
gloves that ease my pain:

[http://www.activeforever.com/smart-glove-wrist-
support?produ...](http://www.activeforever.com/smart-glove-wrist-
support?productid=292)

~~~
DanBC
I've been reclining a lot and now my right arm is painful. I'm not typing with
it at all for the next two weeks. I need to work out some system of props to
rest my elbows on.

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JoeKM
Standing all the time isn't healthy either, but one thing standing desks
promote better is taking breaks more often. I'm more willing to walk around
and stretch if I'm already standing, than if I'm sitting.

I've been using a GeekDesk for 2 years now. I recently purchased a LifeSpan
Treadmill (just the base) for my standing desk as the next step, and really
like it. Careful though, you can't go from sitting to treadmill, it's too much
body shock, you'll need to ease into standing for a few months first.

~~~
joonix
Price is steep on these, presumably due to the motors. Is there a similar desk
that you can elevate with a simple hydraulic foot pedal? Kind of like the
chairs at a hair salon.

~~~
kd5bjo
For a while, my home desk has been a $100 bar table bought from Ikea; if I
want to sit, I have a stool handy.

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tednaleid
Anyone have experience with the Humanscale Float standing desk?
[http://www.humanscale.com/products/product_detail.cfm?group=...](http://www.humanscale.com/products/product_detail.cfm?group=float)

I've been thinking about getting a sit/stand desk for a while, but don't like
the electric ones as they seem really slow. This seems the nicest of the
manually operated ones (better looking than the steelcase one IMO).

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kvee
Does anyone know if sitting at an angle is actually significantly better for
you? The coworking space I work out of in RI just got one of these:
<http://www.focaluprightfurniture.com/ergonomic-benefits/>

~~~
skolos
Or lying on a couch. All studies compare sitting with walking. How about
sitting vs standing? Or sitting vs lying? When I work, I prefer to lie on a
couch rather than sit at a desk. And I am not kidding - I am more productive
that way.

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mtgx
> "Every hour of TV that people watch, presumably while sitting, cuts about 22
> minutes from their life span, the study's authors calculated."

Can that be real? That's a very serious issue if true.

~~~
saurik
This LA Times article, like every article that you ever see discussing any of
these results, describes a causation: "sitting cuts about 22 minutes from
their life span". None of these "studies" were "experiments" that are capable
of demonstrating causation: they are either cohort studies or surveys, and are
only able to demonstrate correlation.

In this case, "The authors constructed a life table model that incorporates a
previously reported mortality risk associated with TV time. Data were from the
Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Australian Diabetes, Obesity and
Lifestyle Study, a national population-based observational survey that started
in 1999–2000. The authors modelled impacts of changes in population average TV
viewing time on life expectancy at birth."

We thereby have to ask, what is the more likely explanation: that sitting
causes your life span to decrease, or that the same things that cause your
life span to decrease make sitting, or watching television, something you do
more often? We aren't doing experiments where we assign people into groups,
one which will sit for most of their life and one which will stand/walk, so we
can't assume the causation.

Maybe you don't have any friends, and maybe that is why you sit inside all day
watching the television. Some people believe being a social outcast directly
leads to health issues, but one could also point out that friends often are
the people who goad you into seeing the doctor for that thing you never cared
enough about, or are quite literally the people who pick you up when you fall,
maybe calling 911.

Alternatively, it could be that your life really sucks, and you need the
outlet of watching television to make your life feel more reasonable. Things
that cause peoples' lives to suck might be abusive relationships, chronic
illness, or stressful jobs (and other studies, I believe even real
experiments, and I even further believe demonstrated mechanisms, show that
stress leads to health problems).

Some might argue "it is easy to control for people who are dying and remove
them from your study", but it is very difficult to control for subtle effects,
and we are talking about a subtle effect here. This is especially true once
you look into compliance effects: people who don't sit around all day watching
television are probably also the kinds of people who visit the dentist
regularly, or simply eat better food.

The result of this mistake is that it could even be _dangerous_ to be making
claims that sitting reduces your lifespan: maybe by telling the people who are
sitting around watching television that its unhealthy for them (again, based
on no direct evidence) causes them to now feel bad about watching television,
increasing their stress, or even causes them to push themselves even further
to exercise, when they were sitting down because their knee was already giving
out.

A lot of people, at this point, get angry at shoddy science reporting. That's
a real problem: articles like this blow studies that are correlations into
causations. The result is that people hear every couple years opposing
information on some debates they care about (such as whether something like
wine or aspirin is "good for your heart"), and eventually decide "it isn't
like scientists know anything" and "give it a year, we'll learn something
new", something they then apply to other branches of science (like evolution).

But, frankly: the scientists who are publishing these papers really need to
use less ambiguous wording--especially if they are not going to be really
proactive reaching out to press to be involved in the writing of the articles,
making certain the right kinds of hedges get quoted by the reporters (which
may scuttle the article, as maybe it is no longer interesting to them: in
comparison to bad information spreading, less reporting should be a positive
thing)--as I think they are complicit in the confusion.

This paper uses wording that technically doesn't imply a correlation if you
know what all of the words mean and you are careful with your reading, but to
any normal person they are quite clearly saying "X causes Y": "The amount of
TV viewed in Australia in 2008 reduced life expectancy at birth by 1.8 years
(95% uncertainty interval (UI): 8.4 days to 3.7 years) for men and 1.5 years
(95% UI: 6.8 days to 3.1 years) for women...".

When I read that, I know that that just means "if I'm building a probability
distribution over the life expectancy of a person (who would be similar to the
people studied, potentially including 'having not heard about this study') and
I know how much TV they watch I can use that information to adjust my
expectation based on this metric, as established by this well-founded study".
However, "X reduced life expectancy" to normal people means "if I do X it will
reduce my life expectancy, and if I avoid X, I can avoid that effect".

:(

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appscript
Is there a good resource online that gives the best practices when sitting on
a chair to minimize damage per second to ourselves ?

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piggybox
I'm glad I replaced my comfortable Herman Miller chair with a very cheap ball
chair which encourages active sitting

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Dewie
At this point I feel that I might as well have a working theory of "if it is
pleasurable or comfortable, it kills me" and go from there...

~~~
youngerdryas
I want to party with you, madman.

