Success in goal-directed visual tasks: the benefits of alternating sitting and standing instead of only sitting

Abstract

Both excessive sitting and excessive standing have been shown to be detrimental for performance, productivity and health. In the present study, our objective was specifically to determine the effect of alternating the body position (between standing and sitting) on task performance and visual attention in the Attention Network Task (ANT), relative to a sitting-only condition. Twenty-four participants (aged 18–35) performed the ANT six times in both conditions (5 min 35 per ANT). The proportion of blinks was significantly lower in the alternating condition than in the sitting-only condition. In both between-condition and within-condition analyses, the reaction times were significantly shorter when standing than when sitting. Humans may be more effective (i.e. a shorter reaction time) and have greater visual attention (i.e. less frequent proportion of blinking) in an alternating condition than in a sitting-only condition. In practice, the use of sit-stand desks might usefully help to both reduce the time spent sitting and improve task performance.