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TED Talks thinks Niels Diffrient has re-imagined the chair and the very way we, as people, sit. I think his design is the product of an old school mentality that is too archaic. Our lives, in general, have become more sedentary than in the past. Growing numbers of people spend large amounts of time sitting in front of a computer, in a chair that is designed to keep them in it. The traditional thinking has always been, “well if the person has to sit in a chair for 8 hours, let’s make them as comfortable as possible”.

Click to View Niels' Ted Talks Video

Unfortunately, that is one of the most detrimental types of thinking for the user as it ignores the type of seating that the body requires in order to stay healthy. While conventional task chair seating uses arm rests to try to reduce the forces on the seat pan and reclining in order to reduce the stresses on the upper thighs and buttocks, it simply moves the stresses from one area of the body to another. This is an inherent problem to all chairs that are static. You can make a chair more comfortable, but that does not necessarily mean it is better for the user’s spine and overall health. Quite the contrary, as the comfort tends to mask the damage the chair is doing to the posture of the user, since it takes longer for that damage to surface.

Arm rests and extra padding are short term fixes for a problem that requires a long term solution. Ideally, any user should not be sitting in the same position for more than 50 minutes at a time without getting up to move around and stretch your back out. The spine and discs are able to best recover from the forces placed upon them when they are dynamic and in new positions with great frequency. When they are static, their ability to recover takes roughly 12 times as long. So for those who are required to sit at a desk for long periods of time and do not take the time to get up and walk around every hour or so, it does not make sense to buy chairs that keep you locked in place like some amusement park ride. For those rollercoaster rides, it is for your safety, but in the workplace, it generally works against you. It is on these principles that the giant Swiss Balls became a workplace trend for a short while. However, they are not the most practical seating to have in a workplace environment and thus that trend fizzled out rather quickly. The dynamic principles behind the Swiss Ball are sound and proven, but the execution in terms of workplace seating was less than stellar. What task chair seating needs is to allow the user to remain dynamic while performing their task as unhindered as possible. Some initial efforts are being made, and there is even one such chair aimed at kids / young teenagers (basically anyone who spends a lot of time playing video games in front of the television), but there needs to be more research and development into this area as we continue to become more rooted to our task seating to accomplish our jobs.