Abstract
We investigated whether activity trackers could be used to differentiate between sitting and standing at adjustable workstations and to determine if sit-to-stand workstation usage was associated with higher activity levels. A paired-t-test was used to assess the difference between the mean step counts measured using the activity trackers during sitting and standing periods among six office workers. Twelve office workers also wore activity trackers while self-reporting their standing as a percentage of total work time every week for six weeks. Spearman correlation was used to assess the relationship between standing percentage and step count. The difference in mean step count between sitting and standing was not statistically significant (p = 0.113) and the Spearman correlation between standing percentage and step count was weak (ρ = 0.301) and not statistically significant (p = 0.342). These findings suggest that basic activity trackers may not be useful in measuring sit-to-stand workstation usage.
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Acknowledgments
Two entities provided support for this research project. The National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health’s Montana Tech Training Program Grant (2016) and the Montana Tech of the University of Montana’s Faculty Development Grant Initiative (2016).
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Forkan, T., Stack, T., Autenreith, D. (2019). Can Personal Activity Trackers Be Used to Provide Insight into Sit-to-Stand Workstation Usage and Benefits?. In: Ahram, T. (eds) Advances in Human Factors in Wearable Technologies and Game Design. AHFE 2018. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 795. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94619-1_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94619-1_3
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