Without a doubt, inactivity is bad for us. Sitting for a long time is consistently linked to increased risks of cardiovascular disease and death. The obvious response to this terrible fate is not to sit, but to move. Even a few moments of exercise can have benefits, studies suggest. But in our modern times, it’s hard to avoid sitting, especially in the office. This has led to a number of strategies for getting up, including the rise of standing desks. If you have to be tied to a desk, at least you can do it while standing, the thinking goes.
However, studies on whether standing desks are beneficial have been scarce and sometimes inconclusive. Additionally, standing for a long time can have their own risks, and the data on sitting at work has also been mixed. While the final verdict on standing desks is still unclear, two studies published this year offer some of the most nuanced evidence yet on the potential benefits and risks of working standing up.
Take a seat
For years, studies have noted that standing desks improve performance scores. cardiovascular and metabolic healthsuch as lipid levels, insulin resistance, and arterial flow-mediated dilation (the ability of arteries to widen in response to increased blood flow). But it’s not clear how significant those improvements are in preventing bad health outcomes, such as heart attacks. An analysis of 2018 suggested that the benefits could be smaller.
And there are good reasons to be skeptical about standing desks. For one thing, standing (just like sitting) is not moving. If lack of movement and exercise is the root of the problem, sitting still would not be a solution.
However, while it can be said that sitting and standing can be combined into the single category of “stationary,” some researchers have argued that not all sitting is equal. In a 2018 position paper Published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, two health experts argued that the link between poor health and sitting could be due to the specific populations being examined and “the special contribution” of “time sitting at home, e.g. on the couch.” daddy effect’”.
The two researchers, professors emeritus David Rempel, formerly of the University of California, San Francisco, and Niklas Krause, formerly of UCLA, pointed to several studies that specifically look at workplace sitting time and poor health outcomes. , which have reached mixed results. For example, a 2013 analysis found no link between sitting at work and cardiovascular disease. Although the study suggested a link to mortality, the link occurred only among women. There was also a 2015 study of about 36,500 workers in Japan who were followed for an average of 10 years. That study found that there was no link between mortality and sitting time among salaried workers, professionals and people working in home-based businesses. However, there was a link between mortality and sitting among people working in the agricultural, forestry and fishing industries.
Still, despite some obscurity in the details, more recent studies continue to uncover a link between fully prolonged sitting—wherever that session occurs—and poor health outcomes, particularly cardiovascular disease. This has maintained interest in standing desks in offices, where people don’t always have the luxury of frequent movement breaks. And this, in turn, has kept researchers on their toes to try to answer whether standing desks have any benefits.