The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain

by Annie Murphy Paul

The continual small movements we make when standing as opposed to sitting—shifting our weight from one leg to another, allowing our arms to move more freely—constitute what researchers call “low-intensity” activity. As slight as these movements appear, they have a marked effect on our physiology: an experiment carried out by researchers at the Mayo Clinic determined that simply by standing rather than sitting, study participants expended 13 percent more energy. The impact on our cognitive functioning is also significant. Research has found that the use of a standing desk is associated with an enhancement in students’ executive function—that crucial capacity for planning and decision making—and with an increase in “on-task engagement.”