Smart Office Chairs with Sensors for Detecting Sitting Positions and Sitting Habits: A Review

Abstract

The health consequences of prolonged sitting in the office and other work chairs have recently been tried to be alleviated or prevented by the application of modern technologies. Smart technologies and sensors are installed in different parts of office chairs, which enables monitoring of seating patterns and prevents positions that potentially endanger the health of users. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of previous research in the field of the application of smart technologies and sensors built into office and other types of chairs in order to prevent diseases. The articles published in the period 2010-2020 and indexed in WoS CC, Scopus, and IEEE Xplore databases, with the keywords “smart chair” and “sensor chair” were analysed. 15 articles were processed, with their research being based on the use of different types of sensors that determine the contact pressures between the user’s body and stool parts and recognise different body positions when sitting, which can prevent negative health consequences. Analysed papers prove that the use of smart technology and a better understanding of sitting, using various sensors and applications that read body pressure and determine the current body position, can act as preventive health care by detecting proper heart rate and beats per minute, the activity of individual muscle groups, proper breathing and estimates of blood oxygen levels. In the future research, it is necessary to compare different types of sensors, methods used and the results obtained in order to determine which of them are most suitable for the future development of seating furniture for work.