<p>I was just reading about how even if you exercise regularly, sitting for long hours per day drastically increases heart disease risk.</p>
<p>So, at work, how long do you sit per day? How much are you getting up and moving around?</p>
<p>I sit most of the day, but I know other engineers who are pretty active.</p>
<p>I started my first job 3 months ago as a Chemical Engineer working in a Unit Ops lab at a research facility. I am sitting at my computer 50% of the time, sitting in meetings and lectures 20% of the time; it doesn’t help that I am sniffing in solvents the rest of the time. At least I go on a 30 min walk during lunchtime.</p>
<p>I imagine most engineers sit around a lot. It’s almost exclusively white collar work… really, you shouldn’t be doing any manual labor at all. The most I can imagine is somebody who has to walk around the office or factory a lot. In that respect, I imagine business types would be more active.</p>
<p>Cleeeearly, none of you has ever met Angry Client. ;)</p>
<p>On submittal days, I actually do a lot of jogging and stair-running. Deadlines are deadlines, and when five o’clock hits and the architect starts calling and wondering why the frack we haven’t uploaded yet, there is sprinting involved. (I’ve also done the one-telephone-to-each-ear thing.)</p>
<p>Normally, though, there is a lot of sitting.</p>
<p>My son works in an oil refinery and he sits about 50% of the time, averaged out. There are many days he doesn’t sit at all.</p>
<p>Some days I sit in my office performing simulations and getting ready for reviews. Other days I get to crawl all over and instrument aircraft and work in environmental labs. Pretty awesome mix, actually.</p>
<p>All day every day. Definitely have to remind myself to move around every couple of hours. Design work about 10%, paperwork to support the design work about 90%. Occasional meetings, maybe once/week.</p>
<p>My old job was about 50/50 as there was a whole bunch of production support, but that was standing around instead of sitting.</p>
<p>It’s still way easier on the body than being a plumber, and it’s nice being able to afford a good health club.</p>
<p>Sitting mostly for 8 hours a day with only a lunch break was the biggest transition for me out of college. I found that I had to get up a walk around about 2pm. I’d use the time to go to the shop and watch, study and get to know the mechanics/welders/machinsts/etc at work. Turned out that the education I got watching them was extremely valuable as an aerospace structural engineer. Later, when I was manager and had a new college hire I’d suggest the afternoon walk around to them as a way to gain knowledge like I did. </p>
<p>I also found that as I was going up the ranks of engineering, I’d sit somewhat less to much less. I’d be walking all over campus to go to meetings (and then sit again), have quick “stand up” meetings or be in the lab conducting/directing testing (where my legs would ache from so much standing) or be in the front of an audience presenting.</p>
<p>I also found that I liked participating in all kinds of after work activities that involved anything but sitting (hiking, softball, ice hockey, etc) as you didn’t have any homework to do once you left the job.</p>