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Why Sitting All Day May Shorten
Your Life
Spending too much time in a chair can unravel your fitness goals and
make you feel older. Here’s how to counteract it.
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Credit...Thea Traff for The New York Times
By Jen Murphy
Oct. 31, 2024
We’ve all heard that sitting too long is bad for you. We’re not evolved to
do it, it can undermine our exercise gains, it causes dead butt syndrome.
Sitting might not quite be “the new smoking,” but too much of it can still
shorten your life.
“Sitting is actually aging you faster,” said Katy Bowman, a biomechanist
and author of “My Perfect Movement Plan.” Whether it’s bone or joint
health, muscle mass or energy level, she added, “a lot of what you
perceive as aging is going to be heavily influenced by your sitting time.”
And we spend a lot of time sitting. Numbers vary around how much
average Americans sit per day, but it may be as long as nine and a half
hours. Studies suggest women sit less than men do, but most agree we all
sit more than previous generations did.
The consequences can be serious. A study published at the beginning of
the year followed 480,000 people in Taiwan over 13 years and found
those who sit most of the work day had a 34 percent higher risk of dying
from cardiovascular disease than those with less sedentary jobs did —
and a 16 percent higher risk of mortality overall.
One way to lower the risk, the authors wrote, was to add 15 to 30 minutes
of physical activity per day to your existing routine. Other studies go
further, suggesting sedentary people need to double the standard weekly
exercise recommendations.
“The bottom line is that too much sitting is a big new health risk,” said
Neville Owen, a senior scientist at the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute
in Melbourne, Australia.
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