Evaluating a school based childhood obesity intervention for posture and comfort

Abstract

Background: Research shows that students who are more active throughout the day have fewer reports of body part discomfort and greater energy expenditure needed to combat childhood obesity. Many factors may contribute to the overall health of the child, including the postures that are required to complete assigned tasks at their school workstations. Decreasing sedentary behaviors in children through the use of standing desks at school has been shown to increase calorie expenditure and may be a viable approach to the energy imbalance typical of modern children. The objective of this research was to quantify and analyze sub-optimal postures and self-reported discomfort of students during the use of traditional seated and standbiased desks to determine whether any unintended consequences of the intervention were present. Methods: A postural analysis based on the Portable Ergonomic Observation (PEO) method was used to assess the posture of 42 elementary school students as they worked at their assigned workstation (either standing or seated). Two classrooms contained stand-biased workstations (15 students) and two classrooms had traditional seated workstations (27 students). Each student was assessed three times at 10 minutes, for a total of 30 minutes of observations each. The percent of time spent in preferred versus non-preferred postures was then computed. Student body part discomfort surveys were used to assess the discomfort of students between the two groups. The relationship between type of workstation and percent time in non-preferred postures and body discomfort was examined using Wilcoxon ranksum tests and Fisher's exact tests, respectively. The significance level was p ≤ 0.05 for all of the two-sided tests. Results: No significant difference was found between the two groups and time spent in non-preferred postures and body discomfort, children using stand-biased workstations reported less discomfort overall. Standbiased desks presented no additional ergonomic issues, while providing increased caloric expenditure. Conclusions: A study containing a larger sample and older children that includes postural observation throughout the school day is needed for future research.

Classroom Standing Desks and Sedentary Behavior: A Systematic Review

“…Thus, a final sample of 8 articles was identified for the present review. Two publications that reported findings pertaining to the same intervention 22,23 were consolidated in the results of the primary study publication. 24 Table 1 summarizes the characteristics of the studies included in our review.…”

New ANSI/BIFMA Standard for Testing of Educational Seating

“…Mark Benden (2011Benden ( -2013 and his team at Texas A&M have also collected anthropometric data on more than 500 children in relation to school furniture that they hope to publish in the next 2 years. Most recently the team released ergonomics details on posture and comfort for children in school furniture with design implications for obese children (Benden, Pickens, Shipp, Perry, & Schneider, 2013).…”

“…Research for the type of information needed in this standard came from sources such as the CAESAR anthropometric database (Harrison & Robinette, 2002) (2003); regional anthropometric data from Benden (2011Benden ( -2013; CHILDATA (June 1995; Norris & Wilson, 1995); sizing of current educational seating on the market; and peer-reviewed papers on use and proprietary industry experience based on internal testing and warranty experience. When using the NHANES (2005NHANES ( -2008 data sets, all persons older than 22 years were deleted from the subject pool, as were all pregnant girls.…”

The Impact Of Stand-biased Desks On After-school Physical Activity Behaviors In Children

“…However, standing for prolonged periods of time during the school-day is not common practice in the United States, leading to questions regarding whether prolonged standing leads to changes in the levels and anatomical locations of discomfort not typically associated with prolonged periods of sitting. As part of a larger intervention, Benden et al (2013) aimed to examine student's sitting and standing posture along with self-reported discomfort while using stand-biased or traditional seated desks. Researchers further sought to understand whether there were any unidentified consequences to implementing stand-biased desks in the classroom which may actually support the retention of traditional seated desks.…”

“…Stand-biased desks are considered a mild environmental stimulus because accessibility alone may not have a sufficient impact on activity behaviors without additional stimuli such as teacher encouragement, or the conscious decision to stand or otherwise change a behavior. The use of a stand-biased desk has been found to result in less postural discomfort overall, however no significant differences have been found indicating less time is spent in nonpreferred postures during use, compared to students seated at traditional desks (Benden et al, 2013). As a result of stand-biased desk use, several studies measuring postural behaviors have also reported significant decreases in sitting time during the school day, with both standing and stepping times increasing as a result (Aminian et al, 2015;Clemes et al, 2015;Contardo et al, 2016).…”