Thinking of changing jobs or moving? Keep an eye on the distance you will have to travel to get to the office, because it is not only sedentary jobs that cause us health problems but also those that force us to commute. This was demonstrated by a Swedish study which investigated the correlation between home-office distance and lifestyle. Result? The more the distance to get to work increases, the more the risk of being overweight, of being under stress and of sleeping poorly increases.
The research investigated the effects of commuting on health with the help of data collected by the Swedish Longitudinal Survey of Health between 2012 and 2018. Researchers looked at the responses of nearly 13,000 men and women aged 16 to 64 on a variety of topics: lifestyle (whether they exercised often, drank, smoked), type of work and if it was exhausting, if they suffered from chronic diseases, stress and depression.
Less time for sports. The research showed that when the home-office distance exceeded three kilometres, commuters had problems with overweight, were more stressed and had a lack of sleep. And even more at risk were those who worked more than 40 hours and traveled more than five hours a week than those who commuted one to five hours a week.
The motivation? Lack of sporting activity. In fact, workers who traveled less than three kilometers were more physically active, probably because the shorter distance traveled made it easier to walk or cycle to work, or also because a shorter commute gave them more free time to practice a sport. In short, if you plan to move further away from the office, also calculate in terms of kilometers and time. And bet on the bicycle: it is ecological, economical and healthy.