Sit Less, Stand More

BACKGROUND: Point-of-decision prompts (PODP) are effective at increasing physical activity and sedentary behavior in the workplace. However, current research that investigates the influence of PODPs on sedentary behavior outside of the workplace is lacking. PURPOSE: To determine if a PODP targeting sedentary behavior influenced the proportion of standing individuals during presentations at an academic conference. METHODS: Twelve, one-hour groups of presentation sessions (Global Summit on the Physical Activity of Children conference, May 2014) were included in this study; half were randomly assigned to the intervention group and half to the control group. The intervention group was exposed to an oral PODP at the beginning and middle of the presentations. Researchers performed three counts: beginning (e.g. first 10 minutes), middle (e.g. 30-40 minutes), and end (e.g. 50-60 minutes); each count included the number of individuals in the audience and the number of standing individuals. RESULTS: A significantly larger proportion of individuals chose to stand during intervention group presentations (16.9± 2.0%) compared to control group presentations (10.5± 1.5%; chi2=7.13; p < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated the effectiveness of PODPs at decreasing sedentary behavior during an academic conference. PODPs are simple, cost-effective interventions that require minimal time commitment, and represent a population health intervention that could reduce sedentary behavior in a large group setting.