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Sitting Down Is Actually Bad For You

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16 April 2018

By Alex Khalil

For extended periods of time, sitting down can have a multitude of negative effects, including memory loss and significant aches and pains a new study suggests. The University of California, LA, has confirmed that spending most of your day sat down may be pretty bad for you.

The study, published by Plos, saw 35 people all aged from 45-65, to undergo a brain scan that specifically looked at the medial temporal lobe, which is used for forming memories. They were also asked how long they spend sitting down during the previous week.

Of the people who were analysed, they found those who spent the most time in chairs had thinner brain structures.

Mood

In their conclusion, they determined that sedentary behaviour could actually increase the risk of dementia and cognitive decline later in life. It could not be sure if sitting was fully responsible for the thinning.

The authors of the study wrote:

‘An important extension of this study would be to explore MTL structures in healthy younger adults, as an example of universal or primary prevention as opposed to our secondary prevention study of those at-risk individuals with minimally detectable symptoms.’

They stated that to increase their understanding of this information, they would need to study younger adults too.

Maybe we could do with a run from time to time?

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