Taking a Stand for Office Ergonomics
办公室的人体工学——站着工作

THE health studies that conclude that people should sit less, and get up and move around more, have always struck me as fitting into the “well, duh” category.

健康研究指出人们不应老是坐着，而应站起来多走动走动。对于这些研究，我的反应总是：“这还用说吗？”

But a closer look at the accumulating research on sitting reveals something more intriguing, and disturbing: the health hazards of sitting for long stretches are significant even for people who are quite active when they’re not sitting down. That point was reiterated recently in two studies, published in The British Journal of Sports Medicine and in Diabetologia, a journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes.

但如果仔细审视这些层出不穷的研究，你会发现一些很有意思但又很令人不安的信息：久坐对健康有巨大的危害，即便对那些在没有坐着的时候能经常运动的人也是如此。最近的两个研究再次提到了这一观点，它们分别发表于《英国运动医学杂志》(The British Journal of Sports Medicine)和欧洲糖尿病研究协会(European Association for the Study of Diabetes)的会刊《糖尿病学》(Diabetologia)。
 

加州大学洛杉矶分校健康服务教授托尼·杨瑟博士在家时一边踩卧式自行车一边工作，在办公室时她则会使用带跑步机的办公桌。

Suppose you stick to a five-times-a-week gym regimen, as I do, and have put in a lifetime of hard cardio exercise, and have a resting heart rate that’s a significant fraction below the norm. That doesn’t inoculate you, apparently, from the perils of sitting.

如果你像我一样每周上五次健身房，大部分时间都在进行刻苦的心肺训练，而且静息心率要比正常人低很多，很明显，这并不意味着你就能摆脱久坐所带来的健康风险。

The research comes more from observing the health results of people’s behavior than from discovering the biological and genetic triggers that may be associated with extended sitting. Still, scientists have determined that after an hour or more of sitting, the production of enzymes that burn fat in the body declines by as much as 90 percent. Extended sitting, they add, slows the body’s metabolism of glucose and lowers the levels of good (HDL) cholesterol in the blood. Those are risk factors toward developing heart disease and Type 2 diabetes.

研究更多的是基于对人们行为健康结果的观察而不是调查与久坐有关的生理或基因变化的诱因。然而，科学家们已形成定论，在人们坐下超过一小时后，人体内用于分解脂肪的酶的分泌量会降低90%。他们还指出，久坐会减缓身体的糖代谢，并降低有益胆固醇（high-density lipoprotein，简称HDL）的水平。这些都是能导致心脏病和II型糖尿病的风险因素。

“The science is still evolving, but we believe that sitting is harmful in itself,” says Dr. Toni Yancey, a professor of health services at the University of California, Los Angeles.

加州大学洛杉矶分校(University of California, Los Angeles)健康服务教授托尼·杨瑟博士(Dr. Toni Yancey)表示，“尽管相关研究仍在进行中，但是我们认为久坐本身是有害的。”

Yet many of us still spend long hours each day sitting in front of a computer.

然而很多人每天仍长时间地坐在电脑前面。

The good news is that when creative capitalism is working as it should, problems open the door to opportunity. New knowledge spreads, attitudes shift, consumer demand emerges and companies and entrepreneurs develop new products. That process is under way, addressing what might be called the sitting crisis. The results have been workstations that allow modern information workers to stand, even walk, while toiling at a keyboard.

好消息在于，当富有创造力的资本主义在按其本身规律运行的时候，问题会成为通往机遇的大门。新知识的传播，人们态度的转变，消费者的需求随之涌现，而公司和企业家们便会开发新的产品。随着这一过程的发展，所谓的久坐危机也会因此而得到解决。结果就出现了新型的工作站，这种工作站允许当代信息工作者一边站立，甚至一边行走一边敲击键盘。

Dr. Yancey goes further. She has a treadmill desk in the office and works on her recumbent bike at home.

杨瑟博士的做法有过之而无不及。她在办公室有一张带跑步机的书桌，在家里边踩卧式自行车边工作。

If there is a movement toward ergonomic diversity and upright work in the information age, it will also be a return to the past. Today, the diligent worker tends to be defined as a person who puts in long hours crouched in front of a screen. But in the 19th and early 20th centuries, office workers, like clerks, accountants and managers, mostly stood. Sitting was slacking. And if you stand at work today, you join a distinguished lineage — Leonardo da Vinci, Ben Franklin, Winston Churchill, Vladimir Nabokov and, according to a recent profile in The New York Times, Philip Roth.

人们在信息时代崇尚人体工学多元化和站立工作也是一种返璞归真。现今，人们往往认为勤奋的职员是那些长时间趴在屏幕前工作的人。但是在19世纪和20世纪初，办公室职员，例如文书、会计和经理，大多数都是站着的，坐意味着偷懒。而且如果你今天站着工作，你将跻身于名人阵营——达芬奇(Leonardo da Vinci)、本·弗兰克林(Ben Franklin)、丘吉尔(Winston Churchill)、弗拉基米尔·纳博科夫(Vladimir Nabokov)以及《纽约时报》(The New York Times)近期人物特写所提到的菲利普·罗斯(Philip Roth)。

DR. JAMES A. LEVINE of the Mayo Clinic is a leading researcher in the field of inactivity studies. When he began his research 15 years ago, he says, it was seen as a novelty.

梅奥医学中心(Mayo Clinic)的詹姆斯·拉万博士(Dr. James A. Levine)是静止状态研究领域的领军研究者。他说，当他在15年前开展这项研究时，该研究还是件新鲜事物。

“But it’s totally mainstream now,” he says. “There’s been an explosion of research in this area, because the health care cost implications are so enormous.”

他说，“然而现在，这项研究已经成为了主流。目前，这一领域的研究到处都是，因为这对医疗成本有着重大的影响。”

Steelcase, the big maker of office furniture, has seen a similar trend in the emerging marketplace for adjustable workstations, which allow workers to sit or stand during the day, and for workstations with a treadmill underneath for walking. (Its treadmill model was inspired by Dr. Levine, who built his own and shared his research with Steelcase.)

大型办公室家具生产商Steelcase公司也在可调节工作站这一新兴市场看到了类似的发展趋势。这种可调节工作站允许职员在工作时或坐或站，而且工作站下面还带有跑步机，以便职员行走。（这一跑步机模型受到了拉万博士的启发，他不仅给自己造了一台工作站，还将他的研究成果与Steelcase分享。）

The company offered its first models of height-adjustable desks in 2004. In the last five years, sales of its lines of adjustable desks and the treadmill desk have surged fivefold, to more than $40 million. Its models for stand-up work range from about $1,600 to more than $4,000 for a desk that includes an actual treadmill. Corporate customers include Chevron, Intel, Allstate, Boeing, Apple and Google.

Steelcase于2004年推出了第一款可调节高度的办公桌。在过去的5年当中，可升降办公桌和带跑步机的办公桌产品系列的销量翻了5番，达到4000万美元。站立工作系列产品的价格从1600美元到4000多美元不等，而且4000多美元的桌子带有一个真正的跑步机。该公司的企业客户包括雪佛龙(Chevron)、英特尔(Intel)、好事达(Allstate)、波音(Boeing)、苹果(Apple)和谷歌(Google)。

“It started out very small, but it’s not a niche market anymore,” says Allan Smith, vice president for product marketing at Steelcase.

Steelcase产品营销副总裁阿兰·史密斯(Allan Smith)说：“这种产品一开始规模很小，但是现在已经不再是利基市场了。”

The Steelcase offerings are the Mercedes-Benzes and Cadillacs of upright workstations, but there are plenty of Chevys as well, especially from small, entrepreneurial companies.

Steelcase的产品可谓站立式工作站中的“奔驰”(Mercedes-Benze)和“凯迪拉克”(Cadillac)，但市场中也不乏众多“雪佛龙”级别的工作站，尤其是那些由小型创业公司生产的产品。

In 2009, Daniel Sharkey was laid off as a plant manager of a tool-and-die factory, after nearly 30 years with the company. A garage tinkerer, Mr. Sharkey had designed his own adjustable desk for standing. On a whim, he called it the kangaroo desk, because “it holds things, and goes up and down.” He says that when he lost his job, his wife, Kathy, told him, “People think that kangaroo thing is pretty neat.”

2009年，丹尼尔·沙奇(Daniel Sharkey)从他干了近30年的工具模具厂下岗了，当时他担任厂里的经理。沙奇喜欢在自家车库鼓捣，他曾为自己设计了一张可站立工作的升降办公桌。他一时兴起将它称为袋鼠桌，因为“它能装东西，也能升降”。他说，当他下岗之后，他的妻子凯西(Kathy)对他说，“别人觉得这张袋鼠桌设计得很巧妙。”

Today, Mr. Sharkey’s company, Ergo Desktop, employs 16 people at its 8,000-square-foot assembly factory in Celina, Ohio. Sales of its several models, priced from $260 to $600, have quadrupled in the last year, and it now ships tens of thousands of workstations a year.

现今，沙奇的公司Ergo Desktop在俄亥俄州塞利那市有一间8000平方英尺（约合743平方米）的厂房，拥有16名员工。公司几种售价在260-600美元之间的型号在去年的销量翻了4番。如今，公司一年出货上万台工作站。

Steve Bordley of Scottsdale, Ariz., also designed a solution for himself that became a full-time business. After a leg injury left him unable to run, he gained weight. So he fixed up a desktop that could be mounted on a treadmill he already owned. He walked slowly on the treadmill while making phone calls and working on a computer. In six weeks, Mr. Bordley says, he lost 25 pounds and his nagging back pain vanished.

亚利桑那州斯科茨代尔市的史蒂夫·柏德利(Steve Bordley)也为自己设计了一个解决方案，随后他将之变成了一门生意。由于腿伤，他无法跑步，体重渐长。因此他设计了一个可以架在自己跑步机上的工作台面。他一边在跑步机上慢走一边打电话、使用电脑。柏德利说，6周后，他瘦了25磅（约合11.3公斤），而且恼人的背疼也消失了。

He quit the commercial real estate business and founded TrekDesk in 2007. He began shipping his desk the next year. (The treadmill must be supplied by the user.) Sales have grown tenfold from 2008, with several thousand of the desks, priced at $479, now sold annually.

2007年，他退出了商业地产业务，转而成立了TrekDesk公司。第二年，他便开始销售自己设计的桌子。（跑步机则必须由用户自己提供。）2008年以来，销售额增长了9倍。目前，这款售价479美元的桌子每年都能卖出几千张。

“It’s gone from being treated as a laughingstock to a product that many people find genuinely interesting,” Mr. Bordley says.

柏德利先生说，“这种一开始被当做笑料的产品正获得很多人的青睐。”

There is also a growing collection of do-it-yourself solutions for stand-up work. Many are posted on Web sites like howtogeek.com, and freely shared like recipes. For example, Colin Nederkoorn, chief executive of an e-mail marketing start-up, Customer.io, has posted one such design on his blog. Such setups can cost as little as $30 or even less, if cobbled together with available materials.

关于站立工作的解决方案，DIY也越来越多。很多都发布在网站上，像菜谱一样免费分享，比如howtogeek.com。举例来说，电子邮件营销初创公司Customer.io首席执行官科林·纳德科恩(Colin Nederkoorn)就在他的博客上发布了一种设计方案。如果利用现成的材料来制作，完成这类设计的成本只需要30美元甚至更低。

UPRIGHT workstations were hailed recently by no less a trend spotter of modern work habits and gadgetry than Wired magazine. In its October issue, it chose “Get a Standing Desk” as one of its “18 Data-Driven Ways to Be Happier, Healthier and Even a Little Smarter.”

近来，《连线》(Wired)杂志甚至将站立式工作站奉为现代工作习惯和装备的风向标。在这本杂志的10月刊中，在《18种能让人更幸福、更健康、甚至变得聪明一些的数据驱动方式》(18 Data-Driven Ways to Be Happier, Healthier and Even a Little Smarter)一文中便提到了“拥有一张可站立工作的桌子”。

The magazine has kept tabs on the evolving standing-desk research and marketplace, and several staff members have become converts themselves in the last few months.

该杂志一直密切关注站立办公桌研究和市场的动态，而且在过去的几个月中，杂志社已有多名员工成为这种产品的忠实用户。

“And we’re all universally happy about it,” Thomas Goetz, Wired’s executive editor, wrote in an e-mail — sent from his new standing desk.