A decades-long study has shown that people who watch less television live about two and a half years longer than their peers who watch more – especially if they are physically active.
Unlike previous investigations that show a link between physical activity and lower risk for cardiovascular disease, the current study zeroed in on the sedentary activity of TV watching itself.
Using data from more than 13,000 people aged 45 to 64 years old, investigators analyzed the amount of TV watching and leisure-time physical activity. After an average of 27 years, people who were highly active and watched little or no TV lived longer free of stroke, heart failure and coronary heart disease than those who often watched TV and weren’t active.
TV watching impacted health regardless of physical activity, the study found. Those who seldom watched or never watched TV lived about a year longer free of each type of cardiovascular disease than those who often watched TV.
“Because there’s such a large cardiovascular disease burden in the U.S., we wanted to focus on how to extend the years you live in health,” said the study’s lead author, Carmen Cuthbertson, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
The findings help clarify how physical inactivity affects health, according to Bethany Barone Gibbs, a professor of health and physical activity at the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in the study.
“Now, we can sit back and not even have to lift a finger to watch the next show on Netflix,” Gibbs told the American Heart Association. “I think television-watching is becoming an even more important target when it comes to behavior change and reducing our risk of cardiovascular disease.”
The study was published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.
