Before and After
Individual results may vary
Case Study: Poor posture, lower back pain and knee pain due to long periods of standing.
Is poor posture making you feel bad?
Everybody knows that poor posture can contribute to physical pain. It can also negatively affect your appearance – it can make you look older, less fit and less attractive.
As we discussed in a recent blog post, posture also plays an important role in how people make assessments about you and your personality. Posture can be the difference between being seen as weak or powerful, timid or confident, and desirable or not.
But aside from the messages your posture sends to other people, have you ever stopped to think about what messages your posture is sending to you? Yes, your posture can have a direct impact on how you feel about yourself and your internal dialogue. It can literally make you feel bad.
Power posture
Research over the past ten or so years is consistently demonstrating that tweaking your posture can actually change your emotions. In her TED talk, Harvard researcher Amy Cuddy, explains how if you adopt the body language of looking powerful and confident, you will actually feel more powerful and confident – and it even influences your hormones.
When investigating the question of whether or not our bodies influence our minds, Cuddy discovered that changing posture has an impact on two key hormones: testosterone, which is the dominance hormone, and cortisol, which is the stress hormone. So by changing our posture, Cuddy found that is possible both to make ourselves feel more powerful as testosterone levels increased, AND so called ‘power postures’ also reduced cortisol levels, meaning that people were better able to react and respond to stress.
Straighten up and lift that self-belief
These findings are supported by other research also. A study at Ohio State University found that people who were told to sit up straight were more likely to believe thoughts that they wrote down while in that posture concerning whether they were qualified for a job. Study co-author Richard Petty, a professor of psychology at Ohio State University, said that, “People assume their confidence is coming from their own thoughts. They don’t realise their posture is affecting how much they believe in what they are thinking.”
Another study suggested that an upright posture can also boost your ability to recall positive thoughts and have a stronger self-image.
See what not slumping can do for your mood
Researchers in New Zealand strapped 74 people into assigned postures with tape, and measured blood pressure and heart rates as they completed a series of tasks designed to assess their mood, self-esteem and stress levels. According to the study authors, upright participants reported feeling more enthusiastic, excited and strong, while slumped participants reported feeling fearful, hostile, nervous, quiet, passive, dull, sleepy and sluggish.
At Spine and Health, we see the evidence every day of the difference good posture can make to quality of life. Improving your posture reduces pain and helps to prevent unnecessary injuries. It helps you to look, move and live better. And now, a growing body of evidence is demonstrating that good posture can help you to be happier and more confident too.
We’d love to chat about how we can help you to improve your posture and see how much better your life can be. Give us a call today to book an appointment with a chiroprator in our North Sydney or Crows Nest clinics.
What’s your posture communicating about you?
At Spine and Health, we’re committed to helping our clients develop and maintain great posture. Improving your posture is one of the best things you can do for your health and makes it easier for your body to move the way it was designed. Good posture reduces pain, allows for a greater range of motion, encourages and enables an active lifestyle.
But posture is also important for another great reason – it is one of the strongest non-verbal messages you send into the world. Whether it is consciously or subconsciously, other people are making judgements about you based on your posture. This can have an impact on your success at work, how quickly you get served at the bar, and of course, in matters of love and attraction. At its most basic, when your posture is better you simply look better.
Hiding or striding?
A slumped posture sends the message that you lack confidence, or aren’t interested in what’s going on around you. Typically, your shoulders cave inwards, making yourself appear smaller – sending the message that you are insecure or even insignificant. It’s the non-verbal equivalent of saying “Don’t look at me.” Posture can either make you appear dominant or submissive – so it’s good advice if walking alone at night to think about standing tall and appearing strong and confident.
And, even more importantly, sending the right physical signals can actually change how you feel. In her TED talk, Harvard researcher Amy Cuddy, explains how if you adopt the body language of looking powerful and confident, you will actually feel more powerful and confident – and it even influences your hormones. Being conscious of your posture is a key element in presenting a positive image to the world.
Hey boy, hey girl
We’re going to appeal to your vanity here: good posture just looks better. If you have good posture, you’ll appear taller and more confident. Posture is also one of the most important body language indicators that can influence if we’ll ask someone out on a date.
You’ll look more energetic and radiate youthfulness. Next time you are out and about, have a look around and you’ll see that it is true – poor posture and a hunched back makes you look old and weak. Nobody wants to look old before their time, and improving your posture can take years off your appearance!
Five simple steps for improving posture
- Maintain a healthy weight. We are partnered with Body Measure, who can help you calculate YOUR ideal weight.
- Pay attention to how you sit, and conduct a regular ergonomic assessment of your work environment. Book in to attend our ‘Sleeping, Sitting, Standing’ information session at the Spine and Health clinic and learn the correct way to sit.
- Sleep tight, sleep right. Consider upgrading to a firmer mattress that provides better support. Ditch the super-high stack of pillows that cause your neck to bend unnaturally and avoid sleeping on your stomach.
- Walk tall and with purpose. Concentrate on pulling those shoulders back and keep your head up looking straight ahead, rather than shuffling about with your eyes looking at the ground.
- Work with a posture chiropractor. At Spine and Health, we are posture chiropractors. We don’t just treat your symptoms, we’ll get to the cause of your problems and fix your posture so that you can remain pain-free.