Science of sitting

We’ve recently talked about ‘positional awareness’ and moving your body as often as possible. Let’s reiterate that this is the take-away message: Move as often as possible, as it’s good for you in more ways than one.  

Let’s take a quick look into the science of sitting, and how posture can effect your lower back. Recently, there was a great Instagram post (credited below), which referenced studies from the 70’s that looked at the angle of your hip whilst sitting, and the subsequent pressure that places on the intervertebral discs in your lower back. The pressure that was produced between L3 and L4 is almost 200% higher, when the hip joint is at 80 or 90 degrees, compared to when standing.

Conversely, when the angle of the hip joint is between 100-110 degrees, the pressure on the discs in the lower back is at it’s lowest. This suggests, sitting slightly reclined, with proper spinal alignment, is the ‘best’ way to reduce pressure on the discs in your lower back.

The takeaway here is that training and ‘corrective’ work will prove very challenging to fix pain if lifestyle factors aren’t considered. The pain you feel whilst in the gym may very well be caused by factors outside of the gym. Food for thought.

Instagram post:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CC-csmgHGbJ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link