Sit less and walk more- a route for healthier aging and increased wellbeing Professor Nanette Mutrie Chair of Physical Activity for Health Director of Physical Activity for Health Research Centre PAHRC www.ed.ac.uk/education/pahrc Dr Liz Such Lecturer in Leisure and Sport 1 Tweet: #sitless
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Sit less and walk more- a route for healthier aging and increased wellbeing
Tweet: # sitless. Sit less and walk more- a route for healthier aging and increased wellbeing. Professor Nanette Mutrie Chair of Physical Activity for Health Director of Physical Activity for Health Research Centre PAHRC www.ed.ac.uk /education/ pahrc Dr Liz Such - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
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Sit less and walk more-a route for healthier aging and
increased wellbeingProfessor Nanette Mutrie
Chair of Physical Activity for HealthDirector of Physical Activity for Health Research
• Step count recorded during working day– Lowest 620 – Highest 8,320
• Ironically – the days when parliament ‘sitting’ created
most activity!
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Top tips
• Use stairs rather than lift• Leave desk at regular intervals• Get outside for a breath of fresh air• Speak directly to colleagues• Do not eat lunch at desk• Use distant water coolers, printers,
photocopiers and toilets
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Issues
• For women – Wearing the pedometer – Solved by new generation pedometers
• Differing number of working hours/day• Working at home days observed to be very
sedentary
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Initial qualitative findings: themes
1. Explored participants’ experiences and thoughts on the project
2. Examined participants’ attitudes towards sedentariness and physical activity at work
3. Looked at enablers and constrainers - physical and cultural
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1. Experience of the project• Overall enthusiasm• Pedometers useful – objective measure• Raised awareness about activity and inactivity• Encouraged behaviour change, certainly in the
short-term• Encouraged reflection on the structure and culture
of work and how that interacted with personal choice and action in relation to physical (in)activity
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2. Attitudes
• General frustration with ‘desk-bound’ existence
• Difficult to build-in activity• Dependent on role – some more active
than others• Blame technology• Broad recognition of need to be more
physically active generally and specifically
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3. Enablers and constrainers
• The physical environment:– Parliament building– Holyrood area
• The cultural environment:– Desk presenteeism– Interruption– ‘Closing’ open spaces – related to ‘siloism’,
confidence– Meetings – sitting, long
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Paul Grice, CEO Scottish Parliament
"I think there is a culture of sitting, and I haven’t really given it deep thought as to why that would be. An obvious one, there’s chairs everywhere! And we’re sitting now. It’s a comfortable, relaxing, informal way of doing things, if we were to stand up right now, we would both I think feel a little more formal about it. … But I think it is an area that could and should be addressed, and I think the way to do that would be perhaps to pilot it more formally [standing meetings] and invite a couple of teams just to try it and then let us know how did it feel … Depending on what comes out of your study, I’d be willing to have a further look at that … maybe get a couple of teams that have been part of this, just to say well would you like to experiment a bit with that and come back with your thoughts”
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http://sitless.wordpress.com/• Blog – please add comments and questions• Tweet using #sitless
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Conclusions• For most people the working day is more
sedentary than active• Modest changes to working practice can
alter that• The parliamentary volunteers have
suggested some ‘top tips’ that could help any workforce– ‘sit less and walk more’