Abstract
Background
There is a dearth of literature on how different domains of sitting time relate to other health behaviours. Therefore, this study aimed to explore these associations in a sample of office workers.
Methods
7170 Northern Irish Civil Servants completed an online survey which included information on workday and non-workday sitting time in five domains (travel, work, TV, computer-use, leisure-time), physical activity, fruit and vegetable intake, alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking. An unhealthy behaviour score was calculated by summing the number of health behaviours which did not meet the current guidelines. Multinomial regressions examined associations between unhealthy behaviour score and each domain of sitting time.
Results
≥7 hours sitting at work and ≥2 hours TV viewing on a workday both more than doubled the odds of partaking in ≥3 unhealthy behaviours [Odds ratio, OR = 2.03, 95% CI, (1.59–2.61); OR = 2.19 (1.71–2.80)] and ≥3 hours of TV viewing on a non-workday nearly tripled the odds [OR = 2.96 (2.32–3.77)].
Conclusions
High sitting time at work and TV viewing on a workday and non-workday are associated with increased odds of partaking in multiple unhealthy behaviours. Interventions need to focus on these domains and public health policy should consider sitting time as an important health behaviour.
Funding
Doughty Fund of the Faculty of Occupational Medicine
Royal College of Physicians of Ireland
National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Leicester Biomedical Research Centre
This is an Open Access Article. It is published by OUP under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported Licence (CC BY). Full details of this licence are available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/