Is doing less housework making you fat? A new study says doing less laundry and vacuuming is having an impact on women's waistlines. The study was published in PLoS One, and it's a follow-up to a 2011 report that used data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The 2011 study determined that in the past 50 years, most American workers have started spending their day sitting down. So, they burned nearly 150 fewer calories during the day, and that contributed to the rise in obesity.
The 2011 study overlooked people who didn't hold formal jobs-- including a lot of women. The new study, however, looks at how women who do not work outside the home spend their days. It found that while women were quite physically active around the house in 1965-- spending an average of 25.7 hours a week cooking, cleaning and doing laundry-- that number dropped to just 13.3 hours a week in 2010.
The study also showed that women were spending far more time in front of a screen while they were at home, contributing to a more sedentary lifestyle.
Photo credit: Flickr.cm/Kastner
