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Take breaks from sitting at work
Taking breaks in sitting at the office expends from 24 to 132 calories during an eight-hour day depending on how much of a break you take each hour:
- a 1-minute break every half hour results in the expenditure of an additional 24 calories over an 8-hour time period
- a 2-minute break every half hour results in 59 extra calories expended
- a 5-minute break every half hour results in an 132 additional calories expended.
Not much you might think but remember: researchers studied the impact of how sedentary jobs impact weight. Using data accumulated since 1970, they found the resulting lessened expenditure of calories to be 100 calories a day—enough to account for a significant portion of the increase in weight gain experienced by women and men in the U. S. over the intervening years.
On other measures, though, the five-minute walks (every hour) were more potent than the concentrated 30-minute version. When the workers rose most often, they reported greater happiness, less fatigue and considerably less craving for food than on either of the other days. Their feelings of vigor also tended to increase throughout the day, while they often had plateaued by early afternoon after walking only once in the morning.
“Reynolds recommends standing for two minutes every 20 minutes while desk-bound — even if you can't move around your office. "That sounds so simple,” one researcher tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. "But that actually has profound consequences. If you can stand up every 20 minutes — even if you do nothing else — you change how your body responds physiologically.”
