Sitting all day is well-documented to be harmful for your health, from impeding your blood flow to increasing your risk of heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. Previous research has even shown that while regular physical activity can reduce some of the negative impact of sitting all day, it can’t undo all of it.
However, a new study found that brief periods of exercise may be more beneficial for your health than previously thought, even if you spend most of the day sitting. This strategy of small bursts of movement throughout the day is also known as “exercise snacking.”
Published Oct. 24 in the The British Journal of Sports Medicine, the new research found that the current recommendation of getting 150 minutes a week of moderate to rigorous physical activity can counteract the harm to your body from sitting for prolonged periods, the study’s lead author, Edvard Sagelv, a researcher at The Arctic University of Norway, told NBC News via email.
“This is the beautiful part: We are talking about activities that make you breathe a little bit heavier, like brisk walking, or gardening or walking up a hill,” he said. “Only 20 minutes of this a day is enough, meaning, a small stroll of 10 minutes twice a day — like jumping off the bus one stop before your actual destination to work and then when taking the bus back home, jumping off one stop before.”
The data came from almost 12,000 people ages 50 and older who wore movement-detection devices for 10 hours a day for four days and were tracked for at least two years. The researchers found that sitting for more than 12 hours a day versus eight hours increased risk of death by 38% — but this only applied to people who got less than 22 minutes of moderate to rigorous activity a day. They also found that the more people exercised, the more the risk of death decreased.
What about lower intensity activity? This only benefitted people who spent 12 or more hours a day sitting.
Previous research also shows the benefits of…
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