Short Wave - Body Electric: The Body Through The Ages

Episode Date: October 7, 2023

Being inside, hunching in front of a computer screen for hours at a time – these things take a toll on our minds and our bodies. Today on the show, TED Radio Hour's Manoush Zomorodi brings their new series Body Electric to Short Wave's Regina G. Barber. We learn about the negative side effects of our sedentary lifestyles and ask what scientifically-backed steps (and how many) it may take to combat them. Join NPR's study with Columbia University here. Movement hacks? Ways to sit less? We want them all! Get in touch at [e-mail] pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Shortwave from NPR. Hey, shortwavers, Regina Barber here with a very special guest, Manus Zamorodi, the host of NPR's TED Radio Hour podcast. Hey, Manus. Hey, Regina. So, Manus, you've got an exciting new series coming out, Body Electric. We do. It is a special six-part interactive series investigating the relationship between our technology and our bodies. and how we can improve it.

That's good because my relationship with technology, I think, is bad. Oh. Because most days I'm sitting in my desk hunched over, staring at my computer screen. I think you are actually speaking for many of us, which is why historian Viabar Kriegan-Reed, one of the researchers I interviewed, says that people today have Anthropocene bodies. Yeah. And the idea of an Anthropocene body is simply one which is being remade and reshaped. by the Anthropocene environment.

So being inside, not getting vitamin D, putting ourselves into positions so that we can see a screen for hours at a time, it's taking a toll. And our bodies are always trying to be the best bodies that they can be for us. And modern life is really, really confusing them. So it's not so much that we're changing through evolution, but we're changing our bodies and what they're able to do through our habits. So look, different economies have always put different demands on the human body, right? Lightning Fast history lesson here. You got hunters and gatherers. They are lean and nimble for all the foraging and hunting and fishing we did for hundreds of thousands of years.

Then about 12,000 years ago, the agricultural revolution happens and we're farming. We don't have to run around to find food, but there is still a ton of movement in our lives. even until about 5,000 years ago when the chair was invented. Weird to think of a chair needing to be invented. Yeah, that's a fun fact. I love it. Right. But only rich and powerful people really sat on them up until about the industrial revolution.

That is when work gets more efficient, of course, with factories. And we start to have the concept of leisure time of sitting. So fast forward a little bit. You get to the 1930s and you get white. collar workers. You get offices with lots of desks. And that's when people really start sitting for a living. Then in the 1970s and 80s, computers, of course, come on the scene. And that's when we start sitting all the time looking at screens, fingers over keyboard, or in the last couple of decades, on tap screens. Okay, so I'm listening to you with this history lesson. I'm thinking about health.

But now we have penicillin and now we have modern medicine. We have safety standards in the workplace. surely things are overall better now these days? Well, sure. I mean, so back then, the threats to our health were more immediate, right? It was losing a limb, inhaling dangerous chemicals. But today we have this slow-moving long-term health crisis that is going to impact us for decades to come. This is very alarming. I think it's going to take some experimenting with social norms to reset our culture when it comes to our habits.

which is where Regina, the interactive part of this series comes in. I'm excited. Let's do it. Okay. So we are partnering with Columbia University Medical School to see if their findings in the lab can work in the real world. And we're inviting our listeners to try out what researcher Keith Diaz thinks might be a simple way to maybe tackle this problem. I'm so interested. We're going to play part of your conversation with Keith, along with laying. out the big interactive element of the series in just a minute.

Okay, so you just heard a fast history lesson of how economic errors have morphed the human body from hunter-gatherers all the way to the Anthropocene bodies we have today. So what do we do about it? This is the focus of NPR's Body Electric, a new series with TED Radio Hour host Manusse Zamoroti. And in episode one, Manus talks to a researcher who thinks he's found a simple way to tackle the problem. So some of the latest data suggests that the average adult spends 11 hours per day engaging in some form of technology. And what are we typically doing when we're consuming technology? Most likely not moving.

Keith Diaz is an associate professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia University's Medical Center. Unfortunately, we live in a world that the default position is sitting. And we see movement now is often an inconvenience. Like, oh no, I left my charger upstairs for my phone. Oh, I got to go upstairs. Okay, maybe you're thinking, well, yeah, I sit around scrolling on my phone a lot, but at least I run or I go to the gym in the morning. Keith says it's still a problem.

It's not enough to just check off that exercise box for your day and think that you're done and you don't have to move the rest of the day. And there's been studies done in the Netherlands where they had people sit for three days straight, and then they had them come back and sit another three days, but exercise for one hour in the morning. And what they found was that that one hour of exercise in the morning before they sat for the rest of the day was not enough to offset the health harms of sitting. I know, it feels so unfair that even if you're working out, it's not enough. But I bet some of you are also thinking, whew, good thing I got that standing desk. I'm not so sure. And unfortunately,

My opinion is that the standing desk manufacturers have capitalized on the news headlines that's sitting as the new smoking and helped convince many consumers that standing is a healthier alternative to sitting. But if you look at the scientific evidence, it is not convincing. The evidence is convincing that long periods of sitting increase your risk for a lot of chronic diseases. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow. but eventually you may get diabetes, many forms of cancer, heart disease, dementia, and sitting can also affect your mental health and your mood, and ultimately decreases your longevity. But so many of us do work that requires sitting at a computer a lot.

We don't have a choice. So what do we do about it? How do we prevent those chronic health conditions? or at the very least, how can we avoid feeling just gross like I do at the end of a long day of typing, zooming, and tapping? Well, this is where Keith's findings come in. If people are going to change their behaviors and tackle this sitting problem that we have, they need targets to shoot for. They need guidance on what do I do?

And so really the goal of my lab is to try to figure out what's the same. the least amount of movement that you can do to offset the harms of sitting. And so that's really what we're trying to do is try to figure out how little we can get away with to offset the harms. So one of the studies that you've done went kind of viral, as they say, over the last year. It was a pretty groundbreaking landmark study. Can you describe it? Yeah. So the straightforward answer is to offset the harms of sitting, you should move every half hour, for five minutes. The main take-home message was

that folks who moved every half hour for five minutes lowered their blood sugar spikes after eating by 60%. Wow. And then it also lowered their blood pressure by four to five points. Can I ask those five-minute movement breaks? Are people getting up and doing jumping jacks? Or what are they doing? This was light walking 2.0 miles per hour on a treadmill.

Oh, not fast at all. No, it's a stroll. We wanted something relatively light that everybody could do. And actually, those folks who moved every half hour, they had lower fatigue levels, they felt more energized, and in general, had a better mood. And why I think this is so important is, you know, we spend our time trying to convince the workforce and employers that you should allow your employees to take breaks to move. And it seems counterintuitive to them like, no, I need them working. I need them productive. That actually a employee who's in a better mood, who's feeling less fatigued and feeling more energized, is a more productive employee.

So I was reading about your work. And I love that there's a prescription, like, do this and you're not going to kill yourself from sitting on your butt all day. So I reached out to you and I was like, what if we could? could invite our listeners to try out your findings in the wild, so to speak. And I was pleased that you were intrigued. What intrigued you, Peath? Yeah. I mean, that's the thing with these, you know, lab-based studies, they're not real world.

I can give you a scientific answer of what you should do about it, but can anybody actually do it? If not, then it's pointless. Okay, so we and PR are partnering with you. and Columbia to do a study with listeners should they choose to join. Let's lay out the plan. Yeah, so the plan is that we're going to ask you to sign up and commit to doing movement breaks. For three weeks. Yes, and we're going to try a couple different doses.

We want to see which ones work and which ones don't. We're going to send you some text messages over the course of the month and just check in and see if you're taking the breaks. If you are, we want to know when are you taking them, what's making you successful in taking the breaks. And if you're not, we just want to understand why not and understand what are your barriers. But we're also interested in seeing, does this change how you feel? Does this change your mood? Can we be more specific about what counts as an exercise snack? Yes, so first off, standing doesn't count.

So we want you moving. And so our ask here is that you walk either in place, if that's all you can do. You can get a stepper and walk on a stepper or just walk throughout your workplace, throughout your home. Okay, so shuffling side to side is perfectly acceptable. I'm picturing what might be not acceptable is like you're on this Zoom call. with your colleagues and you're the one bopping up and down on the screen. But like, that's what we're talking about here, right? Keith, we're talking about a mindset shift. Yeah. Well, I mean, ultimately, what you're getting at is we have to, it's a culture change.

There is this pure social element that we have to break if we're going to actually get this ingrained into everybody's lifestyles. Okay, last question. What if it works? Like, what's your biggest fantasy about our expectations? Yeah. If this works with our experiment, this is just fuel for us to then go and say, look, people can do this. And that's going to help us to start paving the way towards system level change. And that's for me where I want to take this. Okay. So if you are ready to give this project a try and help out Keith Diaz and his team at Columbia University Medical Center, go to npr.org slash. body electric to find out more. But here's the thing. You only have until Sunday, October 8th at 1159 p.m. Eastern to sign up because that is when the study kicks off.

If you're listening after the deadline, that's okay. Try it on your own. Follow along. Woo-hoo. Okay, I am so excited about this. I hope you are too. Please don't be intimidated to take part. Recruit your coworkers, your friends, your family, your neighbor.

to try it with you. If walking isn't an option, Keith and his team will have alternative exercises too. And remember, like, you can't fail at this. Whether or not you stick with moving every half hour or whatever you get assigned, all of it is vital information for these researchers. So do it for science or just do it for yourself. Go to npr.org slash body electric. Please let us know about your experience. Email us. Send us a voice memo at bodyelectric at npr.org. You might hear yourself on the series. You can also talk to me on Instagram.

I'm at Manushe Z. And on Facebook, we're at TED Radio Hour. Next time on Body Electric, the rise of the personal computer and the consideration that went into designing it for the human body. Not. I have not seen any evidence that anyone did any kind of usability or human factors analysis in the design of these things. And it's absolutely obvious that they didn't. That's episode two. Find it in your TED Radio Hour feed or at npr.org slash body electric. Plus subscribers, you get all these episodes ad free and extra bonus episodes to enhance your body electric experience.

Okay, few. It's finally time for the credits. And you know what, actually, I'm going to read them shuffling side to side because might as well start. Body Electric was produced by Katie Montalione and edited by Sanaz Meshkampur with production support from Rachel Faulkner White. Original music by David Herman. Our audio engineer was Patrick Murray. This series was made possible by Anya Grundman, Lauren Gonzalez, Lindsay McKenna with help from Yolanda Sangueni, Beth Donovan, Irene Noguchi, Julia Carney, and Fiona Giren. Special thanks to Shavon O'Connor for her brain power too.

I'm Manoosh Zamorodi, and you have been listening to Body Electric from NPR.