Prolonged Sitting Linked to Worse Job Performance During the COVID-19 Pandemic

By Wiley August 3, 2021

In a study published in the Journal of Occupational Health, workers who had to sit for long periods during the COVID-19 pandemic reported worsened work performance.

In the survey-based survey of 14,648 workers in Japan, 15% of workers said pandemic-related changes in the work environment worsened their work performance, 4% said it improved their work performance, and 81% said it caused no change. While telecommuting both improved and deteriorated performance, prolonged sitting was only associated with performance degradation.

“The COVID-19 pandemic gave us an opportunity to rethink the traditional work style. As our paper suggested, we should avoid sitting for long periods of time to maintain performance,” said lead author Kenta Wakaizumi, MD, PhD, of Keio University School of Medicine, in Tokyo.

Reference: “Prolonged sitting is associated with decreased work performance during the COVID-19 pandemic” by Kenta Wakaizumi MD, PhD, Keiko Yamada MD, PhD, Akihito Shimazu PhD, and Takahiro Tabuchi MD, PhD, Aug. 3, 2021, Journal of Occupational Health.
DOI: 10.1002/1348-9585.12258