Stand Biased Desks

When the present proposal was initially conceptualized the idea was to focus on how stand-biased desks with fidget bars might aid cognition in students with attention difficulties. However, how do you implement a long-term stand-biased desk use study of just children with attention difficulties in a school setting? How do you identify a large enough population without stigmatizing them? It was quickly realized that the way to do this is to do a long-term research project that would benefit all students. Entire schools will be randomized to either keep their traditional seated classrooms or have the stand-biased desks installed in all classrooms. All students in a particular grade with the stand-biased desks can choose to consent to participate in the research project. Analysis will focus on comparisons between traditional seated conditions and stand-biased desk condition within the whole consented population. Further analysis will focus on just one subgroup of differently abled children with respect to learning. Physical activity amounts will be monitored as a means of explicitly knowing how increases in daily standing impact
Participants

Ten Pennsylvania high schools with diverse student populations in terms of gender and ethnic make-up will participate in a four year investigation of how stand-biased class room environments impact cognition. Each school will be randomized to either keep their traditional seated classrooms or be outfitted with stand-biased desks in all classrooms used by their students in grades 9-12. Ideally, 500 students from each condition (traditional classroom or standing-desk classroom) will consent to participate in data collection.

Kessler et al. (2006) gave U.S. 2007 ADHD prevalence by parent-report as 9.5%. At this prevalence rate, it is hoped that within the consented students, there will naturally be 45 + students in each condition who either have a diagnosis of ADD/ADHD and/or have high attention