20 years of sedentary behaviour research: Revolution, evolution, or repackaging?
Keynote Presentation
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14288/hfjc.v14i3.368Keywords:
Public Health, Sedentary Behaviour, Physical ActivityAbstract
Summary of Keynote Address: The idea that too much sedentary behaviour (sitting) poses distinct health risks, over and above the risks posed by the absence of sufficient physical activity, rapidly gained popularity in the first decade of this century, followed by a steady growth over the second decade. Hyperbolic messaging such as “sitting is the new smoking” were intensely promoted in popular media and scientific circles until recently. Starting from UK in 2011, many national public health guidelines have included sedentary behaviour-related recommendations of various degrees of specificity and depth. As a nascent field of research, both scientific evidence and opinion on the importance of sedentary behaviour has varied broadly over the last 20 years. Views have ranged from sedentary behaviour being simply the flipside of physical activity, to sedentary behaviour being a unique risk factor that is physiologically and behaviourally independent.
This keynote provided a critical overview of sedentary behaviour as a research field over the 1999 – 2000 period, starting from the Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis hypothesis and followed by landmark publications on concepts such as “sedentary breaks” and “inactivity physiology”, all the way to the most recent WHO sedentary behaviour guidelines.
The main conclusions were that sedentary behaviour played a critical catalytic role in the evolution of the broader physical activity field; but sedentary behaviour messages were often repackaged and re-marketed physical activity content. The keynote also provided a number of recommendations for future research and public health practice towards better integrating sedentary behaviour into the ever expanding research paradigm of movement and health.
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Copyright (c) 2021 Emmanuel Stamatakis
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