Recently The Economist featured Gesture and the Steelcase posture study most prominently in an article about the variety of new ergonomic seating options hitting the market.
From the article:
“The first ergonomic chairs rolled into offices in the 1970s. Since then, chairs have become ever more accommodating to workers’ peculiarities. One can adjust everything from the height of the seat to a chair’s ‘tilt limiter’ and ‘tilt tension.’ Recent research on the perils of sitting have brought calls for even healthier chairs.
“Steelcase studied the effect of new gadgets (such as iPads and iPhones) on 2,000 sitters in 11 countries. These devices encouraged sitters to squirm a lot, says Mr. [James] Ludwig, Steelcase’s vice-president of global design.
“The company identified nine new postures, including ‘the Swipe,’ with a worker bent over a tablet, and ‘the Take it In,’ a reclined posture for reading or, one assumes, taking a nap. Steelcase’s new $700-880 Gesture chair moves with a sitter in his various poses.”