Your workspace can make a difference in your health and productivity
Office workers who spend most of their 8-hour workdays seated often experience daytime exhaustion and musculoskeletal discomfort
Although standing desks have been found to alleviate physical symptoms and increase productivity, questions remain about the best type of workstation. (CREDIT: Creative Commons)
It might be an exaggeration to claim that “sitting is the new smoking,” but significant research indicates that sedentary people face more health challenges than their active counterparts.
Office workers who spend most of their eight-hour workdays seated often experience symptoms such as daytime exhaustion, hypertension, and musculoskeletal discomfort more frequently than those who are less sedentary. Although standing desks have been found to alleviate physical symptoms and increase productivity, questions remain about the best type of workstation—stand-biased, sit-stand, or traditional—to increase physical activity and prevent health problems.
To address these questions, a research team from the Texas A&M University School of Public Health measured the computer usage and activity levels of 61 office workers over 10 days to evaluate discomfort and develop possible remedies.
The study, published in IISE Transactions on Occupational Ergonomics and Human Factors, was conducted by Tricia Lynn Salzar, DrPH, Kaysey Aguilar, PhD, Matthew Lee Smith, PhD, Adam Pickens, PhD, Gang Han, PhD, Mark Edward Benden, PhD, and doctoral student Grace Anderson.
“What makes our research unique is our use of computer utilization as a possible indicator of, and proxy for, work productivity in all three workstation types,” Aguilar said.
From 2019 to 2020, the team monitored 79 full-time adult office workers at a major university. Participants were placed in three groups based on their workstation type (stand-biased, sit-stand, or traditional), with traditional seated workstations serving as the control group.
Stand-biased workstations featured a fixed work surface at approximately standing elbow height, paired with a drafting stool or chair with an extended cylinder. Sit-stand workstations included desktop units and fully height-adjustable work surfaces paired with traditional office chairs.
Researchers gathered demographic data and information on how participants used office equipment such as footrests, monitor arms, keyboard trays, or anti-fatigue mats. They also collected data on the amount of time workers spent standing and their use of a sit-stand or stand-biased workstation. Participants reported discomfort in various body areas, including the neck, upper back, lower back, shoulder, wrist and hand, hips, knees, and ankles and feet.
To measure productivity, the team monitored participants’ workstation computer use through hidden data-logging software. Physical activity was tracked using an activity sensor worn for one workweek to quantify activity levels and energy expenditures. Each participant’s data were aggregated to ensure a minimum of 10 workdays of computer use data, which were analyzed using statistical analysis software (SAS®).
“We found no significant difference in the number of keyclicks between the three groups, but the stand-biased group had a significantly higher word count and more errors than the traditional group,” Aguilar said. “In addition, the 24-hour activity data revealed that the stand-biased group had significantly more standing time, less sitting time, and fewer transitions per hour compared to their traditional counterparts.”
In terms of discomfort, 65 percent of all participants reported neck discomfort, and 80 percent of the traditional workstation group reported lower back discomfort, compared to 51.7 percent of the stand-biased group.
Although the stand-biased and sit-stand groups stood more and sat less than the traditional group, the difference in outcomes was not statistically significant. However, the traditional group transitioned from seated to standing postures significantly more often, while the stand-biased group expended more energy.
“The bottom line is that the risk of health issues from sedentary work can be alleviated through alternative desk options, like sit-stand or stand-biased workstations,” Aguilar said. “These are win-win solutions because they benefit worker’s health while maintaining the high productivity employers expect.”
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