BeUpstanding™ Blog

The Evidence

All Bite size facts Key resources Latest evidence Tips and tools

Hot Off The Press – Our Test Version of the BeUpstanding™ Champion Toolkit Worked!

Latest evidence

Prior to going live with the BeUpstanding™ program that you see now, our research team tested whether using an online toolkit to guide workplace champions to deliver the BeUpstanding™ intervention was even going to work. The findings of this test version in terms of how champions used the toolkit and the impact of the program have just been published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research Formative Research, while our findings on the acceptability of the test version will be published soon in Health Promotion International. A little background info Did you know that the BeUpstanding™ Champion Toolkit is based off of a previous intervention called Stand Up Australia? Stand Up Australia was evaluated in a cluster randomised controlled trial in workers in Victoria and was shown to be effective and acceptable to both employers and employees. However, the Stand Up Australia intervention, which was delivered by the research team and included sit-stand workstations, seminars, activity tracking, and one-on-one health coaching as part of the intervention, was resource intensive and wasn’t ready for workplaces to just use. The BeUpstanding™ program is the translation of the Stand Up Australia intervention, and was designed to be a low cost / no cost option to support more work teams to…

Keep Reading

The Stone Age Brain and How it Affects Our Physical Activity Levels

Latest evidence

Our physical activity levels have never been lower – can we look to our Homo sapiens ancestors for answers?  We live in a rapidly changing environment with technology defining the modern world we live in. An increase in tasks and jobs automation has led to a vastly different workplace than what we have previously known. Workplaces are now sedentary by nature and require far less energy output as before. The low activity life we have had to adopt is not healthy nor happy. But are there explanations for our ill health in the modern environment which would explain why change is so difficult? Humans have evolved to respond to behaviour triggers like hunger, thirst, and tiredness with behaviours which overcome these desires. These basic instincts worked to keep us alive in the ancestral environment where food, water, and shelter were competitive resources to have and to obtain. By instinctually knowing you were hungry, thirsty or tired, it meant you were able to provide for yourself and keep yourself healthy in harsh environments. These are not instincts we have lost, we still feel hungry, thirsty and tired, and we feel them daily. However, the environment in which we live has changed…

Keep Reading

“Research commercialisation: Tips for starting your journey”

The Evidence

The following article, written by Matt Frith – one of our BeUpstanding™ team members, and managing director and founder of Kin8 – was originally published in The Research Whisperer on May 29, 2018. Research commercialisation can be daunting, but in a landscape of dwindling government funding and ever-shifting technological and commercial realities, it can be a powerful way to bring new ideas and change into the world. For researchers and academics, however, the businesses, people and language can be so different that it’s almost alien. The way a researcher or academic thinks, the goals they have to achieve in their career, are very different to those of a corporate department’s director or CEO. So, how do you begin to feel comfortable exploring the world of research commercialisation? For this post, we’ve put together some detailed tips, based on our experience working with both researchers and corporate partners. The biggest barriers are often emotional, so these tips are designed to get you both thinking and feeling, along with actions, to start your path forward. You have value. We can tell you right now that someone in the corporate sector values what you are doing and what you have. You have intellectual property, processes, team members,…

Keep Reading

“Aus-First Study Shows Cost-Effective Way to Reduce Office Sitting Time”

Latest evidence

An Australian first study, written by Dr Lan Gao at Deakin University, shows how Australia can save BIG if companies invest in sit-stand desks for their employees. These findings are very exciting because they encourage workplaces to support workers to reduce their sitting levels and increase their movement at work. To learn more, check out the media release here, or you can read the full article in the Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment & Health.

Keep Reading

Take a Stand for Ergonomics

Bite size facts

Prolonged, uninterrupted sitting is bad for your health.  Sitting in one place without moving for an extended period of time, is associated with an increased risk for obesity, heart disease, and diabetes. Other aspects of health are also impacted. While it may sound counterintuitive, prolonged sitting can also increase symptoms of muscle pain. “Ergonomics” is the study of how to make a workplace comfortable for employees. Researchers in this field have found prolonged sitting is associated with pain in the lower back, neck, and shoulder regions. This pain can make it difficult for workers to complete job tasks. As a result, ergonomists have researched ways to reduce muscle pain within the workplace. Ergonomists began their research with an understanding that maintaining a single posture for a long time can lead to pain. Their research found this was also the case for sitting. Interventions which broke up sitting were an effective way to reduce muscle pain (examples 1, 2, 3). So, how did they break up sitting? Researchers had employees stand up, stretch, or walk. For these desk-based employees, taking a few minutes to step away from their desk to stand and stretch had the added bonus of reducing eye strain and…

Keep Reading

You should stand in meetings – don’t worry about what others might think

Tips and tools

The following article, written by Benjamin Gardner, Lee Smith, and Louise Mansfield, was originally published in The Conversation on July 2, 2018. Standing in meetings may be good for our health, but it can also make those that are standing feel self-conscious, anxious about how others perceive them, and disengaged from the meeting. These findings, taken from our recent study, suggest that efforts to encourage office workers to sit less and move more must acknowledge the realities of the workplace that conspire to keep people chained to their seats. Sitting has been linked to adverse health outcomes, including increased risk of obesity, heart disease, some cancers, and poorer mental health. While some evidence suggests that the harms of sitting can be offset by at least one daily hour of moderate physical activity, this seems an unrealistic target. Most of the UK population fails to meet physical activity recommendations and spends prolonged periods sitting. Office workers, who make up half of the UK workforce, are particularly inactive. Our 2015 study of 164 London workers found that, on workdays, they sat for 10.5 hours of the 16 hours they spent awake. Breaking up sitting frequently with periods of standing and associated light activity can have important health…

Keep Reading
The good news is, there are 'countermeasures'. Photo: StockSnap

Is sitting bad for us? There’s good and bad news

Latest evidence

The following article, written by Professor David Dunstan – one of our BeUpstanding Academic team members – was originally published in The New Daily on June 25, 2018. As you read this, what are you doing right now? If you’re sitting down, scientists have some good and bad news. First, the bad news. The way most adults work has steadily changed over recent decades. While in many ways our workplaces are ‘safer’ from an occupational hazards perspective, it is now encouraged or even demanded that we spend large portions of our day sedentary (seated) – usually with our eyes glued to some type of screen. While this is now the new norm, we simply weren’t built for such a stationary existence and, unsurprisingly, accumulating scientific evidence demonstrates that exposure to high amounts of sitting significantly increases the risk of premature death, heart disease and type 2 diabetes. Yes, you can help to reduce the risks associated with too much sitting if you undertake daily exercise, but unfortunately science tells us the best estimate of the amount of exercise required is equal to about 80 to 90 minutes per day of moderate-intensity activities (such as brisk walking) or 40 to 45…

Keep Reading

Standing For Brain Health

Latest evidence

A new cross-sectional study by Prabha Siddarth et al. found that the number of hours of sitting per day is inversely correlated with medial temporal lobe (MTL) thickness. In simpler terms, the more you sit, the thinner your MTL and its subregions (entorhinal cortex, parahippocampal cortex, and subiculum). This is important because the MTL plays a key role in memory function and a decrease in MTL has been linked to memory disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease. The study was conducted at UCLA in the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior and participants consisted of middle-aged and older adults aged 45-75. Participants were extensively screened through the Mini-Mental State Examination, BMI, APOE genotyping, and the Hamilton Ration Scales for Depression and Anxiety. Participants were excluded if they had, “a lifetime history of dementia, major psychiatric or neurologic disorders, alcohol or substance abuse, head trauma or systemic disease affecting brain function, or uncontrolled hypertension or cardiovascular disease”, or if they had anxiety or depression disorders. Participants completed a validated self-reported questionnaire (The IPAQ-E) to record the amount of time spent sitting and in physical activity. In addition, each participant had an MRI scan to measure the MTL and its subregions. Statistical analysis of the MRI’s…

Keep Reading

What About Productivity?

Latest evidence

Often when we talk about sitting less, people get concerned about productivity. There’s a belief that to maximize work performance, you’ve got to be doing your work seated. However, just because you are standing up, sitting less, and moving more doesn’t mean your work productivity will decrease. Research often begins in the laboratory so let’s start there too. In one laboratory study, researchers found no differences in cognition when comparing standing to sitting. No differences were also found when examining computer mouse and keyboard performance. In terms of actual productivity measures, improvements have been shown when sitting was broken up with standing in a simulated office environment. Of course, work productivity in the laboratory might be different than productivity in your office. So, what happens when we look at productivity measured in actual workplaces? Overall, research has found that standing desks do not impact work productivity (examples 1, 2, and 3). In fact, in a recent study, we found some employees felt productivity actually improved! It’s not so cut and dry, though. Individual variability and job specific work tasks influence how much standing workstations impact productivity. It can take 2 weeks to adjust to a new workstation but standing can still…

Keep Reading
Navigate