Protecting Your Eyes With Computer Ergonomics
Due to the convenience of working at home, the rise of the digital age, and the abrupt closure of workplace facilities and offices due to the Coronavirus pandemic, millions of Americans have transitioned to working at home full-time. The same goes for online learners or those at universities who are taking classes online to decrease their risk of infection.
Working at home can be a great way to spend more time with your family, relax more throughout the day, and save on your commute, but there are also a few measures to take to make sure you stay safe and healthy. One of these might come as a surprise. How you sit at your desk can actually affect how comfortable your body and your eyes are while you work.
If you work at your computer, do school online, or spend a lot of time looking at digital devices, computer ergonomics can help optimize your comfort, your productivity, and keep your eyes feeling good even if you work all day
Computer Ergonomics 101
You’ve likely heard the term ergonomics used to describe how things work together, how people interact, or how a system is engineered or designed to work at maximum efficiency.
This basic principle applies to more than just science and engineering. It applies to various aspects of life as well, like how you sit at your computer workstation.
So, when talking about computer ergonomics, we’re talking about how to maximize output, comfort, and physical position to make sure your body interacts with your computer screen positively. This is also referred to as visual ergonomics and is vital to preventing computer-related eye fatigue and discomfort after working for long periods of time.
Why Is Computer Ergonomics Important?
Computer ergonomics is an excellent way to increase comfort while sitting at a desk all day and prevent things like poor posture, neck and back discomfort, and even discomfort related to eye strain.
If you’ve ever had an extra-long day at the office where all you did was sit down at your desk and work all day, you’re probably familiar with this discomfort. It’s hard to keep your back straight all day, especially if your desk, seat, and body aren’t lined up properly.
In addition to this, reading emails, typing, and focusing on small text all day can simply tire your eyes, not to mention reading words on a bright screen.
This is where computer ergonomics comes in handy. By making just a few changes to awkward postures, where your computer screen is positioned, adding cushions and pads, you can maximize comfort, reduce stress, and increase productivity while working.
How To Maximize Your Home Office with Computer Ergonomics
Computer ergonomics is a way to change your workspace so you can maximize comfort, position, prevent neck or back-related discomfort, and make sure you stay stress-free and productive all day. This involves changing things like posture, desk set-up, and more.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OHSA) lays out a guide to help you maximize your workspace and practice computer ergonomics. Here are a few basic principles to optimize your work area that you can start with.
Posture
Posture is important for a variety of reasons. From helping balance, correct form while working out, and promoting easier physical activity such as walking up stairs, jogging, and moving in general, there are many reasons to prioritize balance. So, sitting with good posture while you work at your desk is one of the fundamental principles of computer ergonomics.
Here are a few ways to maximize posture while working:
- Keep your head and neck balanced and lined up straight with your torso. Be sure that your neck doesn’t lean forward or backward. It’s also important to note you should always be facing forward rather than twisted around or sideways to your computer screen.
- Your torso and hips should be relatively straight. However, you can slightly relax your torso if you’d like, as long as you avoid slumping over. A back support cushion or footrest could be helpful.
- Your shoulders should be relaxed and kept back instead of jutting forward.
- Keep your legs flat on the floor and your thighs flat on your seat. The back of your knees should hang ahead of the edge of your chair seat.
Along with these tips, you can take any other measure to make sure you’re comfortable while sitting in your chair.
Wrist Position
If you sit improperly at your desk, you may also increase your risk of developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Carpal tunnel occurs when the median nerve in your wrist and forearm is compressed or irritated. It can be caused by a variety of things, such as repetitive movements, especially if improperly positioned.
So, part of computer ergonomics is positioning your wrists properly. Here are two important factors to do this.
First, keep your elbows closer to your torso rather than too far out. In addition to this, your forearms should be horizontal to your body and parallel to the floor. Think of them as being at a 90-degree angle from your upper arms. Keep your wrists and hands in line with your forearms. The latter tip can be assisted with a wrist rest or armrests.
Computer Position
Your computer monitor should also be positioned correctly to avoid needing to move your head or neck to see.
Here are a few steps to make sure it’s correctly in place:
- If your computer is too high or too low, you will have to bend your head and neck to see it. Instead, make sure your monitor is either at eye level or just below eye level.
- Getting an adjustable computer monitor is a plus as you can change this depending on which seat you’re in and how high your desk is. If you have tablets or laptop computers, invest in a docking station to keep them well-positioned.
- Place your monitor approximately 18 to 20 inches away (roughly an arm's length) from your face to maximize head position and comfort.
- Make sure your computer isn’t facing any windows or areas where you may catch glare.
- Adjust your computer’s brightness and contrast to optimize comfort and clarity. You can also increase font size if needed or zoom in on your screen.
Tips and Tricks
Computer ergonomics is something that should help your body relax. These positions are neutral positions that help promote your body’s regular functioning and positioning. If they make you feel stiff, be sure to take a few deep breaths and let your body relax. Your joints should be naturally aligned, helping you to feel comfortable, natural, and efficient in an ergonomic workspace.
The Right Chair
Get the right chair! The right chair will have lumbar support, adjustable height, and other comfort features to help you stay as comfortable and supported as possible while at your desk. It may also help to keep your mouse and keyboard close together to prevent uncomfortably reaching for either.
Anti-Reflective Blue Light Glasses
It can also help to buy a pair of anti-reflective blue light glasses to help keep your eyes comfortable and enhance clarity by reducing reflections. Blue light glasses also help filter approximately 30% of potentially harmful blue light* from digital devices using a patented lens technology.
In tons of style options, colors, and features, there’s a pair of blue light glasses for everyone. Use these to help keep your eyes comfortable while working at your computer all day.
If you need to increase the font size to read your computer screen, answer emails, or help focus on smaller words, you may want to consider reading glasses.
Reading Glasses
Reading glasses have a specific reading strength or magnification, which can help your eyes focus on text and words more easily up close. If the text seems blurry when you read it, or you find yourself needing to move your head away from your computer screen in order to see, you may need reading glasses.
Finding your own reading glasses strength at home is easy with these resources. Once you find the strength you need to read clearly, the right frame shape for your facial features, and the right type of reading glasses for you, bring your reading glasses to your office, home office, and anywhere else to make it easier to read.
Feel Better, Work Better
When you use computer ergonomics, you can optimize your workspace to help you feel better while working. When you feel better, you’re able to get more work done and stay comfortable while doing so. Be sure to focus on comfort while you try to perfect your home office set up and watch your work-life benefit from computer ergonomics.
*Potentially harmful blue light refers to the 415-455 nanometer range of the visible light spectrum. The percentage represents the average amount of potentially harmful blue light filtered at 5 nanometer increments in this range. Covered under U.S. Pat. No. 8,360,574. Other U.S. and foreign patents pending.
Sources:
eTools : Computer Workstations - Checklists - Evaluation | Occupational Safety and Health Administration
Why posture matters | Health Harvard
Carpal tunnel syndrome - Symptoms and causes | Mayo Clinic
Due to the convenience of working at home, the rise of the digital age, and the abrupt closure of workplace facilities and offices due to the Coronavirus pandemic, millions of Americans have transitioned to working at home full-time. The same goes for online learners or those at universities who are taking classes online to decrease their risk of infection.
Working at home can be a great way to spend more time with your family, relax more throughout the day, and save on your commute, but there are also a few measures to take to make sure you stay safe and healthy. One of these might come as a surprise. How you sit at your desk can actually affect how comfortable your body and your eyes are while you work.
If you work at your computer, do school online, or spend a lot of time looking at digital devices, computer ergonomics can help optimize your comfort, your productivity, and keep your eyes feeling good even if you work all day
Computer Ergonomics 101
You’ve likely heard the term ergonomics used to describe how things work together, how people interact, or how a system is engineered or designed to work at maximum efficiency.
This basic principle applies to more than just science and engineering. It applies to various aspects of life as well, like how you sit at your computer workstation.
So, when talking about computer ergonomics, we’re talking about how to maximize output, comfort, and physical position to make sure your body interacts with your computer screen positively. This is also referred to as visual ergonomics and is vital to preventing computer-related eye fatigue and discomfort after working for long periods of time.
Why Is Computer Ergonomics Important?
Computer ergonomics is an excellent way to increase comfort while sitting at a desk all day and prevent things like poor posture, neck and back discomfort, and even discomfort related to eye strain.
If you’ve ever had an extra-long day at the office where all you did was sit down at your desk and work all day, you’re probably familiar with this discomfort. It’s hard to keep your back straight all day, especially if your desk, seat, and body aren’t lined up properly.
In addition to this, reading emails, typing, and focusing on small text all day can simply tire your eyes, not to mention reading words on a bright screen.
This is where computer ergonomics comes in handy. By making just a few changes to awkward postures, where your computer screen is positioned, adding cushions and pads, you can maximize comfort, reduce stress, and increase productivity while working.
How To Maximize Your Home Office with Computer Ergonomics
Computer ergonomics is a way to change your workspace so you can maximize comfort, position, prevent neck or back-related discomfort, and make sure you stay stress-free and productive all day. This involves changing things like posture, desk set-up, and more.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OHSA) lays out a guide to help you maximize your workspace and practice computer ergonomics. Here are a few basic principles to optimize your work area that you can start with.
Posture
Posture is important for a variety of reasons. From helping balance, correct form while working out, and promoting easier physical activity such as walking up stairs, jogging, and moving in general, there are many reasons to prioritize balance. So, sitting with good posture while you work at your desk is one of the fundamental principles of computer ergonomics.
Here are a few ways to maximize posture while working:
- Keep your head and neck balanced and lined up straight with your torso. Be sure that your neck doesn’t lean forward or backward. It’s also important to note you should always be facing forward rather than twisted around or sideways to your computer screen.
- Your torso and hips should be relatively straight. However, you can slightly relax your torso if you’d like, as long as you avoid slumping over. A back support cushion or footrest could be helpful.
- Your shoulders should be relaxed and kept back instead of jutting forward.
- Keep your legs flat on the floor and your thighs flat on your seat. The back of your knees should hang ahead of the edge of your chair seat.
Along with these tips, you can take any other measure to make sure you’re comfortable while sitting in your chair.
Wrist Position
If you sit improperly at your desk, you may also increase your risk of developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Carpal tunnel occurs when the median nerve in your wrist and forearm is compressed or irritated. It can be caused by a variety of things, such as repetitive movements, especially if improperly positioned.
So, part of computer ergonomics is positioning your wrists properly. Here are two important factors to do this.
First, keep your elbows closer to your torso rather than too far out. In addition to this, your forearms should be horizontal to your body and parallel to the floor. Think of them as being at a 90-degree angle from your upper arms. Keep your wrists and hands in line with your forearms. The latter tip can be assisted with a wrist rest or armrests.
Computer Position
Your computer monitor should also be positioned correctly to avoid needing to move your head or neck to see.
Here are a few steps to make sure it’s correctly in place:
- If your computer is too high or too low, you will have to bend your head and neck to see it. Instead, make sure your monitor is either at eye level or just below eye level.
- Getting an adjustable computer monitor is a plus as you can change this depending on which seat you’re in and how high your desk is. If you have tablets or laptop computers, invest in a docking station to keep them well-positioned.
- Place your monitor approximately 18 to 20 inches away (roughly an arm's length) from your face to maximize head position and comfort.
- Make sure your computer isn’t facing any windows or areas where you may catch glare.
- Adjust your computer’s brightness and contrast to optimize comfort and clarity. You can also increase font size if needed or zoom in on your screen.
Tips and Tricks
Computer ergonomics is something that should help your body relax. These positions are neutral positions that help promote your body’s regular functioning and positioning. If they make you feel stiff, be sure to take a few deep breaths and let your body relax. Your joints should be naturally aligned, helping you to feel comfortable, natural, and efficient in an ergonomic workspace.
The Right Chair
Get the right chair! The right chair will have lumbar support, adjustable height, and other comfort features to help you stay as comfortable and supported as possible while at your desk. It may also help to keep your mouse and keyboard close together to prevent uncomfortably reaching for either.
Anti-Reflective Blue Light Glasses
It can also help to buy a pair of anti-reflective blue light glasses to help keep your eyes comfortable and enhance clarity by reducing reflections. Blue light glasses also help filter approximately 30% of potentially harmful blue light* from digital devices using a patented lens technology.
In tons of style options, colors, and features, there’s a pair of blue light glasses for everyone. Use these to help keep your eyes comfortable while working at your computer all day.
If you need to increase the font size to read your computer screen, answer emails, or help focus on smaller words, you may want to consider reading glasses.
Reading Glasses
Reading glasses have a specific reading strength or magnification, which can help your eyes focus on text and words more easily up close. If the text seems blurry when you read it, or you find yourself needing to move your head away from your computer screen in order to see, you may need reading glasses.
Finding your own reading glasses strength at home is easy with these resources. Once you find the strength you need to read clearly, the right frame shape for your facial features, and the right type of reading glasses for you, bring your reading glasses to your office, home office, and anywhere else to make it easier to read.
Feel Better, Work Better
When you use computer ergonomics, you can optimize your workspace to help you feel better while working. When you feel better, you’re able to get more work done and stay comfortable while doing so. Be sure to focus on comfort while you try to perfect your home office set up and watch your work-life benefit from computer ergonomics.
*Potentially harmful blue light refers to the 415-455 nanometer range of the visible light spectrum. The percentage represents the average amount of potentially harmful blue light filtered at 5 nanometer increments in this range. Covered under U.S. Pat. No. 8,360,574. Other U.S. and foreign patents pending.
Sources:
eTools : Computer Workstations - Checklists - Evaluation | Occupational Safety and Health Administration
Why posture matters | Health Harvard
Carpal tunnel syndrome - Symptoms and causes | Mayo Clinic