Modern society has been engineered for sitting.
As a result, humans spend more time off their feet than ever before.
However, recent studies show that all this sitting is doing much more harm than anyone thought.
This article explores why sitting too much is seriously bad for your health.
People Are Sitting More Than Ever Before
The idea that sitting can be harmful seems ridiculous at first thought.
Sitting is a default human body posture, and when people work, socialize, study or travel, they often do so in a seated position. It’s second nature.
However, that doesn’t mean sitting is harmless. It’s like eating — necessary, yet incredibly harmful if you do too much of it.
Unfortunately, sedentary behavior, or sitting too much, is now at an all-time high.
Over half of the average person’s day is spent sitting, doing things like driving, working at a desk or watching television.
In fact, the typical office worker may spend up to a whopping 15 hours per day sitting. Agricultural workers, on the other hand, only sit about 3 hours a day.
BOTTOM LINE: Sitting too much is incredibly harmful. Humans now sit longer than ever before, with the average office worker sitting up to 15 hours a day.
Sitting Limits The Amount of Calories You Burn
Your everyday non-exercise activities, like standing, walking and even fidgeting, still burn calories.
This energy expenditure is known as non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT), the lack of which is an important risk factor for weight gain.
Sedentary behavior, like sitting or lying down, involves very little energy expenditure. It severely limits the calories you burn through NEAT.
To put this in perspective, studies report that agricultural workers can burn up to 1,000 more calories per day than people working desk jobs.
This is because farm workers spend most of their time walking and standing, rather than sitting in a chair.
BOTTOM LINE: Sitting or lying down uses far less energy than standing or moving. This is why office workers may burn up to 1,000 fewer calories a day than agricultural workers.
The Longer You Sit, the Fatter You Get
When it comes to weight management, the fewer calories you burn, the more likely you are to gain weight.
This is why sedentary behavior is so closely linked to obesity.
In fact, research shows that obese individuals sit for an average of 2 hours longer each day than lean people do.
BOTTOM LINE: People who sit for long periods of time are more likely to be overweight or obese.
Sitting Is Linked to Early Death
Observational data from over 1 million people shows that the more sedentary you are, the more likely you are to die early.
In fact, the most sedentary people had a 22–49% greater risk of early death.
However, even though the majority of evidence supports this finding, one study found no link between sitting time and overall mortality.
This study had some flaws, which likely explain why it contradicts all other research in the area.
BOTTOM LINE: The majority of evidence suggests that the most sedentary people have a much greater risk of dying early.
Sedentary Behavior Is Linked to Disease
Sedentary behavior is consistently linked to more than 30 chronic diseases and conditions.
This includes a 112% increase in the risk of type 2 diabetes, and a 147% increase in heart disease risk.
Insulin resistance — a key driver of type 2 diabetes — has been a particular area of interest for those researching sedentary behavior.Studies have shown that walking fewer than 1,500 steps per day, or sitting for long periods without reducing calorie intake, can cause a major increase in insulin resistance.
Researchers believe that being sedentary has a direct effect on insulin resistance, and this can happen in as little as 1 day.
BOTTOM LINE: Long-term sedentary behavior increases the risk of health conditions like type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Inactivity is believed to play a direct role in the development of insulin resistance.
