According to science, how much time should you spend sleeping, sitting, standing and moving each day?

Cardiovascular health is directly related to both diet and nutrition. physical activity or hours of sleep. Activities performed throughout the day affect a person’s cardiometabolic health and glycemic parameters.

Now a team of researchers from Swinburne University of Technology (Australia) and the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute have demonstrated the ideal amount of time for each activity in daily life.

Thus, 2388 participants aged 40 to 75 years were recruited and metabolic and glycemic monitoring were carried out throughout their stay. sit, stand, engage in physical activity and sleep for 24 hours

. To do this, a device was attached to their right thigh and they were monitored for eight consecutive days. During this time, waist circumference, glucose levels and insulin sensitivity index were measured, among other variables.

Daily activities

For the experiment, published in the journal Diabetology, every possible combination of daily activities was implemented and some behaviors were replaced by others for 30 minutes until the optimal number of hours to devote to each activity was obtained. For example, combinations less sitting time and increased standing time, physical activity, and sleep. the most profitable for the health of participants, especially those with type 2 diabetes.

Thus, the researchers came to the conclusion how to divide 24 hours a day to achieve good health:

Sitting: 6 hours (range should be from 5 hours 40 minutes to 7 hours 10 minutes)

standing: 5 hours 10 minutes (from 4 hours 10 minutes to 6 hours 10 minutes)

light physical activity (eg walking or doing housework): 2 hours 10 minutes (between 2 hours and 2 hours 20 minutes)

Moderate to intense physical activity: 2 hours 10 minutes (from 1 hour 40 minutes to 2 hours 20 minutes)

Sleep: 8 hours 20 minutes (ideal range should be 7 hours to 30 minutes to 9 hours)

Christian Breckenridge, director of the report, explained in Medicalexpress that sleep can be harmful to health if it replaces exercise. However, it is useful if it replaces sitting for many hours.

It is always recommended by a doctor to move as much as possible when most of our lives require us to sit in front of screens. “Less sitting and more standing, physical activity and sleep significantly improves our cardiometabolic health,” he said.