Development of Tilting Chair for Maintaining Working Position at Reclined Posture

Objective: The aim of this study is to develop an office chair enabling to keep working at reclined sitting posture. Background: Sedentary workers are supposed to change the posture frequently during long hours of sitting. A reclined sitting position has been recommended to reduce disc pressure. But slumped sitting posture caused by the buttock sliding forward without any adjustment of back reclining is commonly observed. The worker seems to have tendency to change the sitting posture maintaining working condition. We assumed the reason to be their hands movement away from the working space when tilting backward. Method: Slide mechanism allowing seat to move forward was designed to maintain the hand position in working space during reclining. A prototype was manufactured and tilting motion was analyzed using motion capture system. Four experiment chairs were tested including the manufactured prototype chair and three other commercial chairs. Results: A backward movements of the hand position were 13.0mm, 101.7mm, 156.1mm and 139.3mm at the prototype chair, compared to chair B, chair C and chair D, respectively. And the movement was remarkably small at the prototype chair. Conclusion: The developed seat sliding chair allows back tilting maintaining hand position at working space. We expect the user tilting back more often than normal tilting chair during seated work. But further investigation is required to figure out the effectiveness of the developed chair using prolonged working hours. Application: The developed office chair directly affects commercialization.