BeUpstanding™ Blog

September 2021

4 Posts Back Home
Showing all posts made in the month of September 2021.

Does taking small breaks really work?

Bite size facts

A recent research article published by the American Journal of Physiology in 2021, showed that standing and moving around every 30 minutes for at least 3 minutes, taking at least 15 steps during this time, can reduce the negative health complications of prolonged sitting, such as high blood glucose and cholesterol levels. The findings, which were highlighted in a recent New York Times article, showed that frequently taking small breaks from long periods of sitting time – even by doing fairly low levels of moving – can protect and improve metabolic health. The research began by recruiting 16 volunteers. The target group were obese adults (18-60 years) who were in a sedentary occupation or unemployed, with both men and women included. Participants were fitted with an activity monitor and a blood glucose monitor. They were then monitored for one week to capture their baseline levels of activity and glucose control. After the baseline period, participants were randomly allocated into control groups and intervention groups. Participants in control groups continued with their normal lifestyle. However, participants in the intervention group were prompted to take frequent short breaks from prolonged sitting throughout the day. Every 30 minutes participants in intervention group were…

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Investment and usage of sit-stand workstations

Latest evidence

One strategy that has been shown to result in substantial reductions in workplace sedentary time, particularly when accompanied by behaviour change programs like BeUpstanding, has been the use of sit-stand workstations. These workstations allow a user to shift between a sitting and standing posture while working on their computer. The popularity of sit-stand workstations in Australia has exploded, with a report showing a 400% increase in sales of sit-stand workstations since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, with over 90% delivered to home addresses. This phenomenon isn’t just restricted to Australia with a global market research report showing that sales of sit-stand workstations are expected to reach $2.8 billion by 2025. To date, the majority of research on sit-stand workstations has been from the perspective of the user, i.e., the individual employee. However, it is also important to understand their use and implementation from the perspective of the decision maker responsible for their purchase. One of our outstanding BeUpstanding PhD candidates, Haroun Zerguine, has conducted research to address this evidence gap. His findings, which have been published in Applied Ergonomics (here and here), are summarised below. What was done The study included an online survey as well as interviews with…

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What our international teams are aiming to achieve with BeUpstanding

BeUpstanding Stories

Although BeUpstanding was initially designed to target Australian based workplaces, the program is available globally. To date, we have had over 160 teams from 35 countries outside of Australia sign up to the program. Most of the teams are from the United Kingdom and the United States, however, we also have teams from the Czech Republic, Malaysia and Switzerland taking part in our program. As part of the sign-up process, users are asked what they are aiming to achieve from the program. In previous blog articles (Part 1 & Part 2), we have examined what our Australian teams responded to this question. In this article, Bachelor of Health Sciences placement student Rou Jing Tham dives into the data from our international organisations. Data used and key findings: When users sign up to the BeUpstanding program, one of the questions that they were asked is ‘What are you hoping to achieve by your work team taking part in BeUpstanding?’ We explored the responses that we have received so far from our international teams and identified four main reasons: (1) to improve the working atmosphere; (2) to improve health and wellbeing; (3) to increase awareness; and, (4) to change the working environment.  Create…

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Who are our small businesses taking part in BeUpstanding?

BeUpstanding Stories

Small business is one of the priority sectors that we are targeting for our national implementation trial of BeUpstanding. In a previous blog, Bernice Chong reported on why small business is one of our priority sectors. In this blog, she looks at the characteristics of the small businesses taking part in BeUpstanding. Over 100 Australian small businesses (defined as fewer than 20 employees) have championed this cause and partnered with the BeUpstanding team in tackling prolonged sitting in their workplace. Qualitative studies on champion and staff experiences doing the BeUpstanding program found improvements in knowledge/awareness about sitting, cultural norms, perceived stress, productivity, and resilience, benefitting team culture and staff wellbeing. This aligns with current research that reported reducing sitting and increasing movement promotes worker health, safety and wellbeing with positive impacts on productivity, staff morale and talent attraction and retention. The average Australian adult spends a large amount of time each day sitting at work. 75% of the average Australian’s workday is spent sitting. This substantial percentage makes the workplace an ideal target for intervention to reduce excessive sitting. The characteristics of the small business teams taking part in BeUpstanding A total of 132 Australian small businesses have registered their interest…

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