Iran Occupational Health

  Background and aims

  Educating of students that have the ability to solve society problems, is considered as the most important task of universities. This important issue is achieved through effective education in a safe and stress free environment. Proper design of classroom seats proportional to anthropometric characteristics of students not only can improve academic quality but also prevent musculoskeletal disorders. In addition it may encourage students to practice correct sitting habits. This study was conducted to check the correlation of physical dimensions of students and prevalence of musculoskeletal disorder with educational chair dimensions that provided by companies.

  Methods

  This descriptive - analytical study was performed on 115 students of 18 to 27 years. 15 anthropometric parameters correlated with sitting on the chair were measured by anthropometry page and anthropometric caliper gauge. Dimensions of two Types of seats provided in the classrooms were compared with the standard seat dimensions.

  Results

  comparison of dimensions confirmed that seat dimension and students dimensions correspond with one another only in elbow length parameter and other parameters were not correspondent with each other. T-Test showed that there are significant  differences between girl and boy parameters.

  conclusion

  Comparison of the results of measurement of  physical dimensions and chair dimensions with results of emotional dissatisfaction questionnaire and body map chart showed that plastic chair is better than wooden type in term of comfort, chair kind and slope of back rest, and in using plastic chairs students do not have to change their sitting postures however,  due to incorrect design of foot rest and high effective depth of sea,،  discomfort and pain in lower limbs is higher in plastic chairs when compared with wooden chairs.