The study showed that reducing sitting time both at work and during leisure time was, in fact, possible. At baseline, participants spent around 5.6 hours at work sitting down and 3.8 hours during their leisure time.However, after the counseling sessions, intervention participants decreased the leisure time they spent sitting down every day by 21 minutes and increased their light-intensity physical activity and the number of breaks in-between sitting time.
Additionally, the study found that women managed to increase both light physical activity and the number of sitting breaks in the workplace. Men, on the other hand, were not able to do so.
Fasting blood sugar levels - which is a measurement commonly used to check for prediabetes and diabetes - was found to be slightly lower after the counseling. Also, a biomarker of cholesterol and cardiovascular disease called Apolipoprotein B-to-Apolipoprotein A-1 ratio was found to improve over the year.
Furthermore, participants in the intervention group maintained leg muscle mass, whereas those in the control group lost 0.5 percent more muscle mass.