Too much sitting? Try the adjustable-height desk

SOURCE: GeekDesk

Sitting at a desk all day is hard on the body, especially the back. What the body needs is variety and the ability to move. One solution is an adjustable-height desk – one that allows you to alternate throughout the day between sitting and standing.

Farhad Manjoo describes his experience with one such desk in a New York Times article. He tried out the GeekDesk, which comes in two models, selling for $749 or $799 (plus $110 shipping to the 48 states). Not cheap. It includes an electronic motor that adjusts the height with a flick of a switch, from anywhere between 26″ and 46.5″.

You can find inexpensive versions of the adjustable-height desk, such as this one I found at Best Buy, but you have to do the adjusting manually. That means removing your computer and monitor and possibly everything else accumulated on your desktop, then putting everything back after you change the height. Right there, that’s an impediment to alternating between sitting and standing with any frequency.

Finding the sit/stand balance to your day

While standing is great, you have to assume there will be times when you simply want to sit down. Manjoo describes the experience of Donovan McNutt, the GeekDesk’s inventor. Donovan is a computer programmer who has back problems.

Although standing up all day seemed better for his back than sitting down, the real pleasure was in being able to change positions over the course of the day. A moveable desk lets him do that; whenever his body threatens to stiffen into a single aching pose, he switches to another. On any given day, Mr. McNutt spends about 20 to 40 percent of his time standing up to work.

And here’s Manjoo’s own experience:

After a few days of warming up, I settled into a pleasant sit/stand routine. Because I found it difficult to drink coffee or eat breakfast at my desk while standing, I began most mornings seated. I’d begin to stand about an hour later. If I had to write an article, I’d remain standing for most of the day. But if I was planning to spend a lot of time on tasks that required less creative focus — surfing the Web, making phone calls, watching online videos — I’d usually switch back to sitting at around lunch time.

Does standing increase creativity and burn calories?

Manjoo, as well as Nichole Stuzman, manager of the ergonomic furniture company Anthro (which also makes an electronically adjustable desk), believe standing improves creativity:

I suspect that this [increase in creativity] is because when you’re standing, you feel a bit unchained from your desk. If I got stuck on a word or sentence as I wrote, I found myself shaking my arms, bouncing on my feet or stepping away from the desk for a bit — things I couldn’t do in a chair. Often, the antsy-ness seemed to relax my mind enough for me to get over my creative hurdle.

Manjoo also reports that he gets hungrier when standing for an extended amount of time. You do burn more calories standing than sitting, but not that many – about 12 to 30 more calories per hour. Of course, if you’re at home, you can position your exercise bike or treadmill under your table. In the workplace, it will probably be a decade at least before progressive, health-conscious employers start to offer adjustable-height desks to employees, let alone allow exercise equipment.

When I worked at a corporate desk job, I brought in a large exercise ball and substituted it for my chair. This allowed me to be in constant motion (especially my spine), my legs didn’t get tired from standing, and it was inexpensive. I now use a ball at home, where the only disadvantage seems to be those moments when a cat can’t seem to get comfortable sitting in my lap.

Farhad Manjoo writes regularly on technology for Slate. He’s also the author of True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society. The book covers both sides of the political spectrum: Republican success with getting the public to believe the Swift Boat attack and the claim by Democrats that the 2004 election was stolen from John Kerry. There’s also an excellent chapter on truthiness. I recommend it highly.

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