AppliedErgonomics 1981, 12.

1, 19-26

The seated man (Homo Sedens)

The seated work position. Theory
and practice
A.C. Mandal

Finsen Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark

Modern furniture in schools, factories and offices is constructed in such a way that no
one can use it properly. Each day people sit for many hours hunched over their tables in
postures extremely harmful to the back. No one should be surprised that more than
half of the population today is complaining of backache. In no other field of human
activity is a similar gap between theory and reality found.
A closer study of 'normal' sitting postures will explain why nobody is able to sit in
the 'ideal' position. First of all, the eye in this position is at a distance of 5 0 - 6 0 cm
from the book or working material and the axis of vision is horizontal. In addition, this
posture requires at least 90 ° flexion of the hip joint, yet the normal human being can
only bend 60 ° .
A considerably better sitting posture can be obtained if the table is tilted about 10 °.
In this way the book is brought closer and at a better angle to the eye. The worst bending
of the neck is thus avoided. Furthermore, the seat can, with advantage, be tilted 20 °
forward to reduce the flexion of the lumbar region. By both these means the extra 30 °
flexion, which is the most strenuous part of flexion, is avoided.

Almost half the population of the industrialised world ie, 2 0 - 3 0 cm, compared with the 5 0 - 6 0 cm of the upright
is thought to be suffering from some form of back position. It is here that the crucial problem of school
complaint. Every year sick-pay, medical treatment, children's work position is to be found.
hospitalisation, rehabilitation and disablement pensions
consume enormous sums of money. In general, treatment If there is to be any hope of limiting the number of back-
is not started in earnest until the patient is no longer patients, the school must decidely be the place where
capable of working. Very often this proves to be too late
to cure the patient.
In recent years there has been an increasing
understanding of the importance of prevention in contrast
to cure. Thus, more interest has been paid to sickness at the
place of work. Oddly enough, little interest has been shown
in the largest work-place of them all - the school. However,
in the last 20 30 years there have been attempts to improve
the working position of school children by replacing the old
desks with new types of tables and chairs. The so-called
upright position -- viz, with the joints of the hip, knee and
ankle at right angles - has been considered the correct
position. All anthropometric measures (eg, Oxford, 1969;
Peters, 1969) and all dimensions of furniture have evolved
around this particular posture. The new draft from ISO
(International Standard Organisation, 1977) for dimensions
of educational furniture is illustrated by a pupil sitting
upright (Fig. 1).
But no normal children can sit in this position for more
than 1 - 2 min and they can hardly do any work as their
axis of vision is horizontal. As soon as children have to read,
write or do arithmetic they bend over the table in order to
position their eyes at a reasonable distance from the book, Fig. 1

0003-6870/81/01 0019 08 $02.00 I~) IPC Business Press Applied Ergonomics March 1981 19
prevention should be attempted. Strangely enough, school
directions never contain any justification of why children
should sit upright. For, without doubt, this position seems
to be both anatomically and physiologically incorrect since
the resting or functional position of the hip joints is with a
bend of 45 ° and not of 90 °, (Keegan, 1953). Therefore,
this position produces an extreme joint position and it is
generally agreed that this should be avoided.
Children sit in all positions other than the 'upright' one.
A study of their 'evasive' action should indicate how better
sitting postures could be obtained. When school children
consistently refuse to work in the 'upright' sitting position
it is high time to try new ways. At least there is a yawning
gap between theory (Fig. 1) and reality (Fig. 2).
As school children appear to have preserved their common
sense in this question, I believe that they should be allowed
to determine to a large degree what is best for them. After
all, they are the ones who have to sit painfully for 4 - 5 h
each day. For a start, why not try to improve the work-
posture of those pupils already suffering pain or who have a
markedly poor posture - eg, very tall pupils? Without
doubt, it is within this group that a very large number of
future disability pensioners are to be found.

The anatomy of the sitting posture

In order to understand the problems involved in the
sitting posture it is necessary to study the anatomical
alterations that take place when a person changes from a
standing posture to a sitting one. The teaching of anatomy
has never stressed more than the 'normal anatomical
posture', which corresponds closely to the military alert
position. A fact which is most curious since no normal
person willingly assumes this position! Nobody seems to
have been interested in the position most of us assume for
most of the day - viz, the sitting position. In fact, we can
no longer regard ourselves as an erect race, and it could be
said that homo sapiens has now become a new race - homo
Fig. 3
sedens. This complete alteration of man's behavioural
pattern from hunter, fisherman and cultivator to sedentary
life bent over books, machines, assembly lines and the like
has apparently been a heavy load on man's back. Few people
nowadays attain middle age without having experienced
back discomforts (Keegan, 1953).
In recent years interest has been shown in the actual
anatomy of the sitting posture, and a number of excellent
investigations have been made by internationally recognised
experts, such as/~kerblom (1948), Keegan (1953) and
Schoberth (1962). Knowledge of their work, however, has
never extended beyond a limited group of specialists. As
backs can twinge at any time for anybody I consider it
worthwhile making these investigations better known. In
the following pages much use has been made of the drawings
and tables of these experts.
When a person moves from a standing position to an
upright sitting one (Fig. 3), most people imagine that the
hip joints move through 90 ° . However, the movement is
more complicated since only 60 ° of the bending comes
from the hip joints while the other 30 ° comes from a
flattening of the lumbar curve. Keegan (1953) illustrates
this in Fig. 3. Notice the pronounced flattening of the
lumbar curve occurring when seated on an ordinary chair
with trunk and thighs at right angles.

Rotation of the pelvis

This lumbar alteration with an approximate 30 °
straightening of the curve in the upright seated posture is
of extreme importance. The alterations in the lumbar region
and hip joints are given in greater detail by Keegan (1953)
Fig. 2 in Fig. 4.

20 AppliedErgonomics March 1981

 Fig. 4C illustrates the relaxed posture we adopt when, for
example, we are lying on our sides. The hip joints are bent
45 ° (or 135 ° if the upright position is 180°). This is the
resting or functional position of the hip joints where the
muscles at the front and back of the thighs are in relaxed
balance. Here the back has a concave backwards curve. When
the thighs are bent upwards in the hip joints, as in Figs. 4D
and 4 E the muscles at the back of the thighs (hamstring
and gluteal muscles) are tightened. These are attached to
the back of the hip and seat bones and thereby produce a
rotation of the pelvis around a transverse axis.
The lumbar curve is therefore altered in 4D to a slight
convex shape, while in 4E the convex is more pronounced.
The muscles of the front of the thighs are quite relaxed. If
the thighs are bent backwards in the hip joints (4B) the
muscles of the front of the thighs are tightened (quadriceps
and iliacus) bringing about an increase in the concavity of
the lumbar curve. Standing erect increases this lumbar curve
due to pelvic rotation. Fig. 4B corresponds to the standing
position, and on moving to the right-angled sitting position
4D at first a bending of the hip joints of 60 ° is produced
and then a flattening out of the lumbar curve of about 30 °.
The flattening of the lumbar curve
The work position of school children has been carefully
examined by Schoberth (1962). In the ordinary relaxed
Fig. 4
J do when reading, writing or drawing, most of the movement
b back a 30 ° flexion seems to be the maximum load the back
Fig. 5
Normal nucleus pulposus
Posterior displacement
degenerated fibrocartilage
protrusion of disc
Fig. 6
sitting position he found among 1035 children not one who
preserved the lumbar curve. If the children were told to sit
up - ie, with conscious muscular tension - he found a
lumbar curve in 30.5%. Children are particularly well-suited
to illustrate the problems of the sitting posture since their
backs are more flexible than those of adults. Even at the
age of 3 0 - 4 0 the flexibility of the back is reduced
considerably and the marked lumbar curvature apparent in
children is no longer visible. In addition, with age the work-
distance is increased as one becomes more long-sighted. In
what follows I shall mainly deal with the work position of
children.
In Fig. 5 Schoberth (1962) shows the rotation of the
pelvis when moving from the standing to the sitting position,
the angle of the hip joint being 50 °. A tangent to the seat
bone has been drawn in to aid measurement. This has been
drawn through the leading edge of the two large concavities
in the rear edge of the seat bone (greater and lesser sciatic
notches). With these lines it is possible in radiographs to
show how much the pelvis rotates, viz, how much the back
moves forward - here 40 °. By examining 25 people
Schoberth found that an average flattening of the lumbar
curve of 30"4 ° took place on sitting down. This lumbar
bending occurred in nearly all the cases in the 4th and 5th
lumbar discs. It is exactly these two discs that give rise to
most cases of slipped disc and it is therefore important to
reduce this over-bending as much as possible. Even in the
ordinary relaxed position there is considerable loading. If it
is necessary to bend further forward, such as children always
will also take place in the 4th and 5th discs, which are thus
additionally loaded. In the whole of the breast region of
the spine there is practically no movement since the ribs
give stability. Keegan (1953) illustrates this loading of the
discs in Fig. 6.
When stooping, the front edges of the lumbar vertebrae
are pressed towards each other with considerable force
(50-100 kgf). Thus, the lumbar vertebrae press the discs
back towards the spine while the rear edge of the vertebrae
are pulled apart apart with a corresponding force. Chronic
back pains are often localised in the lower lumbar region
and sufferers characteristically find they cannot sit in an
upright position for any length of time. Even for a healthy
can take for longer periods (Keegan, 1953).
Applied Ergonomics March 1981 21
School children's work position with pains in the back or legs immediately feel that tile
tightness and discomfort decrease. For some people an
The right-angled or optimum sitting position is even today
adjustment period of I 2 weeks is necessary as the seat
still regarded by Scandinavian schools as being best suited
for pupils. The old desks are being replaced by new 'ideal' feels very 'alive'. Instead of a passive drooping position
chairs that ought to produce better work-positions. The it is necessary to sit in an upright, relaxed, balanced
results of these experiments can clearly be seen everywhere position, and at first this can be rather tiring. In the
and without doubt they are disastrous! Never before have beginning it is advisable to use the chair for only 15 rain
the pupils been so poorly seated. When relaxing it is not too at a time. Posture has to be changed and muscles trained to
bad but when reading or writing they have to sprawl over a completely different sitting function. Throughout the day
the table to get to their books. No justification has ever been one makes countless little unconscious positional corrections
given for this position being better than any other. when using a tilting chair and this should be an ideal method
of training the muscles of the body. The swaying balance
The Danish National Council for Domestic Science has position furthermore gives greater mobility when, for
described the principle as illustrated in Fig. 7 as follows: example, answering the phone or filing papers. Similarly,
" . . . The seated position will give least load on the back if it is more easy to get up from. Once one has got used to a
there is a slight curve in the lumbar region, just as in the tilting chair it is not uncommon to feel restricted by an
standing position. The shoulders should be relaxed and the ordinary office chair.
upper arm hang loosely down. The neck must not be bent
too much during work. If the shoulder and neck muscles
are tense the result will be pains and infiltration in the
muscles. The seated position is correct if right angles are to
be found in the body: in the hip joint, in the knees and in
the ankles. If there is work at a table then a fourth right 3-5cm! 55- 60crn
!
angle should be found, viz, in the elbows" (abbreviated). i
In Denmark some school classes have for 5 years been
thoroughly trained in right-angle working postures; Fig. 2
shows one of these classes. Not one child is working in an
acceptable posture. The reasons for this are:
(a) No child can sit in the upright posture for more than
a few minutes, as they can only bend the hip joints
The
~dealr"
chai i4~cm
I
about 60 ° .
Fig. 7
(b) The curve (lordosis) of the back is characteristic of
the standing posture. In sitting the rounded back
(kyphosis) is the only natural posture.
(c) In the upright posture the eye is 5 0 - 6 0 cm from the
book - and children must have their eyes at 2 0 - 3 0 cm
distance.
Evidently we have tried to alter the anatomy of the child.
It appears more reasonable to alter the chair, to fit to the
human anatomy.

The child's tilting chair

Children often tilt forward on the front legs of their
chair when working at a table. Because of the risk of the
chair legs breaking, and the chances of tilting over, they
soon abandon the practice. Some years ago I was suffering
from a back complaint and could hardly carry out my work.
One day when I was writing I, by chance, tilted forward on
the front legs of my chair and, to my surprise, something or
other helped my pain. At that period I had undergone
numerous forms of treatment, none of which had had any
effect whatsoever. When, later on, the legs of my chair
broke, I had an office chair converted so that the seat could
tilt freely backwards and forwards. The typists also soon
discovered the advantages of my tilting chair and whenever
I wanted to use it, it was not available. Thus, I was forced
to obtain more.
Fig. 8 shows a child on an ordinary chair. The thighs
slope about 30 ° below the horizontal, the hip joints bend
an estimated 60 ° and, in this position, a straight back can
be held with the lumbar curve intact.
As a rule, most children find out how to use a tilting
chair correctly without any instruction. Similarly, people Fig. 8

22 Applied Ergonomics March 1981

 Fig. 9 shows Keegan's (1953) illustrations of the
movement of the lumbar vertebrae in relation to the sacrum
(and so to the whole pelvis). In the resting position, C, the
difference in relation to the two standing positions A and B
is only slight. The great change in the lumbar curve takes
place in moving from the resting position C to the right-
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
angled sitting position D, and to the bent reading-writing
position E. The closer we approach C the more we protect
our backs.
Fig. 10 shows the tilting chair. The seat slopes 15 °
forwards in contrast to the normal 5 ° backwards. Thus 20 °
of lumbar bending is saved.
The table-top slopes 5 ° , saving another 5 ° in the lumbar
region. Together, the worst 25 ° of back bending is avoided.
At the same time a more relaxed balanced posture is
obtained giving greater mobility.
The tilting seat in Fig. 11 is blocked so that the seat tilts
5° backwards. The table-top is horizontal. The back is
completely rounded and the front edge of the chair cuts
into the thighs.
Schoberth's (1962) drawing (Fig. 12) shows the position
of the spinal column with a preserved lumbar curve (lordosis),
straight back and rounded back (kyphosis). It can be seen
that the flexibility of the lumbar spine is actually quite
limited. The bottom of the spinal column rests on the pelvis
"(sacrum). This then makes a firm foundation for the
flexible spinal column. The dotted line on the diagram
(added by the present author) passes through the 5th
lumbar disc The line can be called the base line of the
spinal column, and the angle between this and the
horizontal (base angle) is decisive for the shape of the
lumbar spine. Schoberth (1962) writes: "In the upright
sitting position we have never seen a lumbar curve where
the base angle was less than 18 °. Conversely, a rounded back
has never been found where the base angle was more than
10°. ,,
In the ordinary, relaxed sitting position the base line is
practically parallel with the seat. If the seat is tilted 20 °
forwards the base line will still be parallel with the seat, and
Fig. 11
Applied Ergonomics March 1981 23
the base angle will be 20 ° - lordosis has been attained!
Because of the special shape of the sacrum in the child the
base angle in the sitting position is quite small, and so they
all sit with a rounded back in the resting position. With
70crn,'"./:" o

puberty the rounding of the sacrum increases (Schoberth,

1962) and, at the same time, the base angle of the spinal
column also increases. Thus it is possible to obtain a curve
in the lumbar spine, and as the working distance is also
increased the reading-writing position is somewhat better
than in the older classes.
When sitting (as shown in Fig. 13) in the right-angled,
backward-inclined sitting position (a) it is possible to reach
across the table in two ways: either by bending, say, 20 °
in the lumbar spine (b) and so rounding the back and loading
Fig. 12
A B C
Fig. 13
the discs; or by stretching about 20 ° in the knees (c) as with
a tilting chair, and so maintaining a straight back in the
bent position.
Fig. 14A shows the extension of back muscles in various
sitting positions (data taken from 10 subjects). If the right-
angled position is regarded as a resting or zero position,
there is an extension of 4-8 cm when sitting on the front
edge of the seat with the eyes 30 cm distance from the book.
If the seat is tilted the extension is reduced to less than half
and, additionally, if the table-top is tilted 10 °, the extension
almost disappears.
In Fig. 14B, the pressure, in mm Hg, on the seat was
measured by three inflatable blood-pressure cuffs placed in
the front, middle and rear zones respectively. In the normal
bent position on the front edge of the seat most of the
pressure is localised in the front zone. With tilting there is
equal pressure distribution in all three zones.

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24 Applied Ergonomics March 1981

How can work-positions be improved?
Theoretically there are many possibilities. But since even C
excellent theories have proved unusable in practice it is
important to feel one's way forward to methods that the
pupils can accept - in other words use for hours. Generally, 10 °
positions could not be worse than they are today so there
are millions of school children to experiment with. Pupils
have apparently found out how to get the best out of
existing furniture, and have obviously had sufficient body
sense to protect themselves against the worst encroachments.
It is during school age that the child's bones are so soft that Fig. 15
they can easily be deformed by long-term stretching or
squashing. Thus, the best place to begin an effective
prevention against crippling back complaints will be the
school. In recent years there has been much interest in
obtaining chairs and tables of the right height. But this just
does not solve anything since practically all pupils have
poor work positions - even those with tables and chairs
of the correct height.
Proposals to improve the work-position (Fig. 15) are
given below:
Sloping table tops
The old-style school desks had a top sloping at 10 ° and
so the working position was correspondingly 10° less
30
Y
43 72

Fig. 16
rounded. With a slope of 30 °, as on the Victorian standing
desk, most people will have a perfect posture for writing
and reading. In addition, the book would be almost at right-
angles to the line of vision. By loosening a few screws, and
inserting a couple of wedges many flat tables could be
converted. Why not try this for those pupils with back pains,
writer's cramp or particularly bad postures? /I
J
Higher chairs (see Fig. 16)

Y
In recent years there has been a tendency to make chairs
lower and lower; which is odd since the pupils have been
getting taller and taller! If one sits on the edge of a normal
table (72 cm in height) or a high stool most people will
Fig. 17
retain perfect posture with the lumbar curve intact. The
hip-joints are, in fact, close to their normal resting position
of 45 °. When sitting on a normal chair (height about 43 cm)
the lumbar curve will be flattened by about 30 ° even with a
vertical trunk. Finally, when sitting on a low stool (30 cm)
everyone will get a rounded back.
The ideal chair height, naturally, must depend on the
height of pupil and table; but, in general, it can be said that
for each centimetre the chair is made higher the hips will
have to bend one degree less. The seats of the old-style desks
were about 47 cm high.

Fig. 18
Higher tables (see Fig. 17)
The upright desk is once more coming into fashion for it x
really does provide a better work position. Presumably the
tallest pupils ought to have tables that are 2 0 - 3 0 cm higher a
than the existing ones. When leaning forward to write, the
elbow should be in contact with the surface of the table, y
and in order to get down to the 72 cm height the individual
has to fold up completely. The old school desks were b
considerably higher than those of today, for the maximum
height was 81 cm.

Forward sloping seats or tilting chairs (see Fig. 18) C

In order to judge the effect of the slope of the seat the
rear chair legs should be wedged up. The same effect can be Fig. 19

Applied Ergonomics March 1981 25

obtained by placing a firm cushion under the seat bone.
A seat with a surface that gripped would be an advantage.

Larger letters (see Fig. 19)

When reading small letters at a great distance (Fig. 19a)
the eye sees the letters through a very small angle (x). This
angle is decisive for the clarity of the picture formed on the
retina. In exacting work one tries to make a large and clear
picture on the retina - ie, a greater angle (y). This can be
done either by placing the eye closer to the letter (b) or by
using larger letters (c). Larger letters would make it possible
for children to sit more upright. Small children can focus
(accommodate) right down to 6 7 cm. This ability decreases
with age so that at 50 years most people have to use glasses
in order to see the letters.

Riding
Without doubt the best sitting posture is obtained on
horseback. (Fig. 20). The hip joints are in the resting
position with a bend of 45 °. Thus the hip joints and lumbar
spine are not loaded in an extreme position. The lumbar
curve is maintained (see Fig. 4), and a perfect balanced
position is obtained in which the body adjusts its centre of Fig. 20
gravity - it is level with the 9th thoracic vertebra - the
whole time with small correcting movements above the
supporting surface. If you do not get the hang of it, you
soon fall off. The use of riding is increasing for the
rehabilitation and treatment of people suffering from References
complaints of the motor system. ,~kerblom, B.
1948 'Standing and sitting posture'. Stockholm: Nordiske
Conclusion Bokhandeln.

Modern work-chairs are constructed in such a way that
nobody can use them without excessive loading of the back.
As most people will sit for many hours every day this means
a more long lasting strain on the back than anything else.
More than half of the population is today complaining
of back-ache. If prevention of back-ache is to have any sense
we must try to reduce the long lasting strain on the back.
To achieve this we must study the anatomy of the seated
man, study the forces acting on his bony construction, study
how the chair should be constructed to avoid this strain on
the back, and study how books and other items can be
placed at a reasonable distance from the eye.
The construction of chairs has so far mainly been based
on tradition and fashion. In future it ought to be based on
knowledge of the anatomy of the seated man.
International Organisation for Standardisation
1977 TC 136/SC 7: Fachnormenausschuss Holz. K61n.
Keegan, J.J.
1953 JBone Jt Surg, 35, 5 8 9 - 6 0 3 . 'Alteration of the
lumbar curve related to posture and seating'.
Oxford, H.W.
1969 Ergonomics, 12.2, 140-161 'Anthropometric data
for educational chairs'.
Peters, T.
1969 Ergonomics, 1 2 . 2 , 1 6 2 - 1 7 0 'Anthropometrische und
Physiologische Grundlagen zur Gestaltung yon
Btiroarbeitssitzen'.
Schoberth, H.
1962 'Sitzhalten. Sitzschaden. Sitzm~ibel.' Springer, Berlin.

26 AppliedErgonomics March 1981