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It's funny. Laugh. Science

Slacker or Sick 232

Posted by samzenpus from the can't-help-being-lazy dept.
dancpsu writes "Researchers at Temple University's College of Health Professions found that early nerve damage caused by repetitive strain injuries can trigger "sick worker" syndrome -- often mistaken for poor performance. They discovered that nerve injuries caused by low-force, highly repetitive work can be blamed on an onslaught of cytokines -- proteins that help start inflammation. Unexpectedly, the researchers also found that the cytokines affected the rats' psychosocial responses. At three weeks, even before the rats experienced pain from their wrist injuries, they began to self-regulate their work behavior. By five weeks to eight weeks, when cytokine production reached "peak" levels, some rats curled up in a ball and slept in between tasks."
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  • A good reason to stop reading Slashdot tonight (Score:4, Insightful)

    by saskboy ( 600063 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:46AM (#13886925) Homepage Journal
    "Early nerve damage caused by repetitive strain injuries can trigger "sick worker" syndrome -- characterized by malaise, fatigue and depression"

    If this doesn't prompt you to get up from your computer and go to bed a bit earlier tonight, there's no hope for you, in other words. You'll be involluntarily curled up like a rat ball, if you don't take charge of your wrist health.

  • I'm confused (Score:4, Funny)

    by confused philosopher ( 666299 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:49AM (#13886935) Homepage Journal
    When did employers ACTUALLY start hiring real rats for the rat race?

    Oh, sorry, I read the story a bit more carefully now. Never mind.

    • Re:I'm confused (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      When did employers ACTUALLY start hiring real rats for the rat race?

      Since they realized it was cheaper than outsourcing to India.

    • Two words: (Score:4, Funny)

      by StandardDeviant ( 122674 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:24AM (#13887074) Homepage Journal
      Middle.

      Management.

      *shrug* If they didn't hire rats, there'd be unemployed MBAs and JDs clogging up the gutters. It's as much a public health issue as anything else.
      • There is such a glut of MBA's right now that it's a wonder they don't already clog the gutters.

        I had toyed with the idea of going back to school for a masters degree and was leaning toward an MBA. But I was struck by the realization that I'd be very much opposed to many of the ideas they'd put across in an MBA program.

        So instead I'll probably just get a Masters in Library Science. Oh well.
      • You read the story?

        You're obviously new here.

        Wait - 122674? Never mind.

    • The hard part was getting over the Rat's inhibitions.

      Turns out there are some things that even a rat won't do. Especially not for cheese.

  • No wonder I've been nodding off at wo...Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

    • Re:That explains it! (Score:5, Funny)

      by grammar fascist ( 239789 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:33AM (#13887096) Homepage
      No wonder I've been nodding off at wo...Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

      Amazing! Your head hit just the 'z' key, and held down the SHIFT key simultaneously for the first one! And then, somehow, your computer submitted your comment. How do you do that?

      I wish I could do that.

      Anyway, more seriously: Why is this story tagged as humor? I read the article, and there's really nothing funny in it.

      Not that that stops us from taking it lightly, of course.
      • Why is this story tagged as humor?

        Check out this thread [slashdot.org] on the supposedly serious topic of planetary exploration.

        What else do you come here for? Elightenment?

      • Anyway, more seriously: Why is this story tagged as humor? I read the article, and there's really nothing funny in it.

        You beat me to it. I was going to say: the Slashdot editors have answered the questions "slacker or sick?" by adding the Python foot icon. Illness isn't funny, but (for some reason) slacking off from work or AT work, _is_ considered funny. Therefore, the answer is that these so-called scientists with their fancy book-larnin' don't know what they're talking about; people who perform badly

      • Amazing! Your head hit just the 'z' key, and held down the SHIFT key simultaneously for the first one! And then, somehow, your computer submitted your comment. How do you do that?

        King Arthur: [about the slashdot post] What does it say, Brother Maynard?
        Brother Maynard: It reads, "No wonder I've been nodding off at wo...Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"
        King Arthur: What?
        Brother Maynard: "at wo...Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"
        Sir Bedevere: What is that?
        Brother Maynard: He must have feel asleep while posting it.
        King A

    • Re:That explains it! (Score:5, Funny)

      by BorgHunter ( 685876 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @08:17AM (#13888043)
      MAYNARD: It reads, 'Here may be found the last words of Matt Perry. He who is valiant and pure of spirit may find the Holy Grail in the Castle of Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz'.
      ARTHUR: What?
      MAYNARD: '... the Castle of Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz'.
      BEDEVERE: What is that?
      MAYNARD: He must have fallen asleep while typing it.
      LAUNCELOT: Oh, come on!
      MAYNARD: Well, that's what it says.
      ARTHUR: Look, if he was falling asleep, he wouldn't bother to type 'Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz'. He'd just snore it!
      MAYNARD: Well, that's what's written in the post!
      GALAHAD: Perhaps he was dictating.
      ARTHUR: Oh, shut up.
  • Damn, now they really have a reason to block slashdot at work places: it adds to RSI and then "sick worker syndrome"

    • Yeah, they couldn't ban it on "impact to productivity" grounds before! Good thing they've finally got an excuse.

      • My old workplace [stream.com] aggressively banned game sites and various diversions, but for some reason Slashdot was never banned. I suspect the IT staff also browsed it on a constant basis and wouldn't let it happen ;^)
  • ...who felt sorry for the rats?
  • > By five weeks to eight weeks, when cytokine production reached "peak" levels, some rats curled up in a ball and slept in between tasks.

    I do that at work from time to time as well.

  • How did they cause these injuries? (Score:5, Funny)

    by maxarturo ( 71956 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:55AM (#13886967)
    What kind of exercises give rats "wrist injuries"? Did they get little rat-sized keyboards?

  • Rats? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Associate ( 317603 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:57AM (#13886969) Homepage
    Who Moved My Cheese [whomovedmycheese.com] if you really want to be insulted.

    • Re:Rats? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by ScruffyScrode ( 812789 )
      I've actually read this, it's a not-so-subtle peice of corporate propaganda. It causes the reader self doubt; and sometimes convinces the reader that THEY should change for the better of the corporation. If this peice of shit were given to me by my boss I would quit in no quiet, or kind way.
      • Crazy. My girlfriend said she read it and actually liked it. I've seen it floating around, but I've never read it, myself. Of course, I think she enjoyed it because it has mice in it.

    • Re:Rats? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by TapeCutter ( 624760 )
      During the late 90's (2000?) I worked for a very large, very blue IT corporation who were busy gobbling up the Australian market from the top down. They rounded everyone up into confrence rooms and paid us (contractors included) to watch a video version of "who stole my cheese". I didn't know wether to be insulted or amused. I took the cheque and figured it was just another "Through the looking glass" moment from the HR department in order to qualify for a tax break. I trully didn't think anyone could possi
      • About a year after a very blue company turned my division very red, the new company bought into this scheme about the cheese to illustrate why some people were going on permanent vacation.

      • Re:Rats? (Score:3, Informative)

        by Suicyco ( 88284 )
        Usually this crap book is sent around by the PHB's as a preemptive strike against layoffs down the line.

        It basically tells you that it is a good thing to get fired and you are a pussy if you don't want to get fired. I once worked for a corporation that bought crates of these books, gave one to every employee during "training" and then layed off a third of the company at the end of the quarter.

        • Re:Rats? (Score:3, Interesting)

          by TapeCutter ( 624760 )
          Yep, that's what I meant by "childish propaganda". The real pussies are the PHB's who turn to fairytales because they can't look you in the eye and tell you the work has dried up.

  • Personally, I'm a slaker (Score:4, Insightful)

    by slaker ( 53818 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:57AM (#13886971)
    Personally, I'm a slaker. But I come by that naturally. My father, and his father, and his father, were all slakers. It is the way of our people.

  • Cytokines (Score:5, Informative)

    by Red Flayer ( 890720 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @12:59AM (#13886979) Journal
    Here's some more info on Cytokines:

    http://microvet.arizona.edu/Courses/MIC419/Tutoria ls/cytokines.html [arizona.edu]

    I wish TFA was a little more specific on which kind of cytokines they found... I guess we'll have to wait for the human studies.

    Really, though, this should be no surprise. It's been known for some time that stress to the body results in immunological cytokine release.

    The symptoms (pre-RSS) that they mention, like depression, fatigue, etc, are eerily similar to Epstein-Barr... I wonder if the immne system is revved up by the repetitive motions (hence feeling sick), or inhibited, like the EBV toxin.

  • "low-force, highly repetitive work" (Score:5, Funny)

    by BocaJuniors ( 924973 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:11AM (#13887022)
    Hello, Peter. We need to talk about your TPS reports.

  • residency (Score:2, Funny)

    by frankmu ( 68782 )
    sounds like life as a resident. boy did it suck. yep, not much different than life as a lab rat.
  • Maybe that's why I get so incredibly tired when I'm typing 20-30 pages a day. Earlier this summer it was so bad I thought I had narcolepsy. Then it got better, but now that I'm writing a lot again it's heated up. I slept for 23 hours yesterday.

  • I hve a simple solution. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Bob Cat - NYMPHS ( 313647 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:17AM (#13887043) Homepage
    I do not allow my rat to use a mouse.

     

  • Sounds like me during Exams! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Foktip ( 736679 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:19AM (#13887050)
    Damn, do those Rats go to University too?

    Repetitive strain injury is one thing, but if you combine that with ultra-stress, depression, insane workloads, and extremely difficult work... THEN you're fucked. The common term for this phenomenon is "University".

    Your hand is so sore you can barely write with it; your fingers seem permanently dented where your pencil resides.. in fact, every muscle in your body aches. Theyve been aching for so long you cant remember.. painkillers do nothing now. Youve had 8 strong coffees, your mind is numb and throbbs... Your neck is so stiff and sore... not a wink of sleep in days, yet you just couldnt fully fall asleep if you tried. Social interaction is futile - you can barely manage to utter coherent language, and most of such encounters are awkward and embarassing. All you can do is calculation, logic - the world around you seems etherally mechanical, filled with logical/mathematical portent. Youve been sitting on your bed for 12 hours straight, listening to the same song over and over, its 4AM, and nothing makes any sense anymore. Possible failure looms, watches you like a hawk - it forces you onward, mercilissly. Theres over 20 hours more material to study. The exam starts in 4 hours.
    • I've been out of college for 14 years now.
      I almost never use a pen or pencile any more.
      There is a permanent dent on my right middle finger.

      And I have carpal tunnel. The doc says- "If you want it to stop- stop typing."

      Lately I'm typing up "Use Cases" 6 hours a day.
    • Study skills help. My schedule was insane (20 units + newspaper work + grading) until I forced myself to set definite times for everything. Give it a try; those skills that you never needed in high school actually become useful in college. Took me a bit to figure that out.
    • My advice to you is go and "dig ditches" for ten years so you can get some perspective into your life.

    • Re:Sounds like me during Exams! (Score:4, Funny)

      by lahvak ( 69490 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @11:08AM (#13889043) Homepage Journal
      Your hand is so sore you can barely write with it; your fingers seem permanently dented where your pencil resides.. in fact, every muscle in your body aches. Theyve been aching for so long you cant remember.. painkillers do nothing now. Youve had 8 strong coffees, your mind is numb and throbbs... Your neck is so stiff and sore... not a wink of sleep in days, yet you just couldnt fully fall asleep if you tried. Social interaction is futile - you can barely manage to utter coherent language, and most of such encounters are awkward and embarassing. All you can do is calculation, logic - the world around you seems etherally mechanical, filled with logical/mathematical portent. Youve been sitting on your bed for 12 hours straight, listening to the same song over and over, its 4AM, and nothing makes any sense anymore.

      I agree, I am at a University too, and I feel just like that when grading exams.

      Possible failure looms, watches you like a hawk - it forces you onward, mercilissly. Theres over 20 hours more material to study. The exam starts in 4 hours.

      Oh. Never mind.

  • likely story (Score:3, Insightful)

    by drgonjo ( 746794 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:19AM (#13887051)
    Sure... the rats "self regulate" their activity because of the possibilty of damage. Please... somebody...show me the same behavior in ever crack and war crack players (I'm guilty of both). If the tendency did exist to self regulate potenatially repetive stress related injuries I'd say that their logs would confirm as much. We've got tons of human related data.. why aren't we using it instead of rats?
    • We've got tons of human related data.. why aren't we using it instead of rats?

      Because you can't dissect or vivisect a human when you want to find out what's going on in their guts.

  • Promising shift in user interfaces (Score:3, Interesting)

    by The Clockwork Troll ( 655321 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:22AM (#13887066) Journal
    Here is the Institute for Interactive Research's example of clickless user interface [dontclick.it] that I hope more application developers espouse in the future.
    • While the interface is interesting, the fact that you still are hanging onto a mouse is a drawback. The other drawback I see is that if this were to be incorporated into all programs today (as it is demonstrated on that website), I feel that the amount one could do with a program would be limited. For example, take Firefox. If you had 10 tabs lining the top of your browser, how could you get to the 'back' button or the 'reload' button? I feel this interface would prove a hinderance because you would have to
      • While the interface is interesting, the fact that you still are hanging onto a mouse is a drawback.

        With this? [abilitynet.org.uk]

        Or this? [autohotkey.com]

        Personally, my idea of a clickless user interface is a terminal window (vi keybindings, etc.), but the referenced link is indeed interesting.

      • Thank God that site wasn't around back in the day when the mac was being invented. Apple users would be stuck using a 0-button mouse now! What is need is not less ways to interact with the interface, but more- more buttons, more wheels, dials, etc. The greater variety of manipulative tasks the interface offers you, the less repetitive stress you will suffer and the increased functionality of the UI will increase efficiency. Anyone who has adapted to make full use a good mouse, such as the logitech models th
    • ... finally - a problem to go with his zero-button mouse solution!
    • An interesting development, but moving in the wrong direction.

      The fundamental problem with user interface isn't excessive richness of expression, it's the inability of computers to understand rich expressions. Mice are already "point & grunt", a system that would have intolerably low bandwidth for human-to-human communications. Humans have basically dumbed down their communication as far as they should be expected to; losing the ability to "grunt" isn't going to help.

      (Note that this doesn't say much abo

    • Slow (Score:3, Insightful)

      by shadow_slicer ( 607649 )
      When you click something, it is activated NOW. When you move your mouse over something there is a delay before it is activated.
      When I want to get something done, I want to get it done NOW. I can't stand the delay.
      Furthermore making actions time-based means that it is impossible for you to stop in the middle of something, since the mouse would continue to select various things if it gets bumped around while you are doing something else.

  • Treatments? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Writer ( 746272 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @01:32AM (#13887092)
    The article goes into details about repetitive work, cytokines, and work injuries. But it doesn't mention any remedies. Is the process reversible? Are there medications that can treat the production and effect of cytokines? If this is found to apply to humans, can a worker's routine be changed slightly, or would that person need to go so far as to completely change their job and lifestyle? Would they be able to fully recover?

    • Re:Treatments? (Score:2, Informative)

      by nido ( 102070 )
      ... so I was talking to my cranial osteopath while he was working on me... "Do these 'lesions' ever come back?" He responded immediately with a "no", then paused, and corrected himself - "well, if they don't fix the work environment they will", and he modeled how a secretary might hold the phone up to their ear with their shoulder as an example of how someone might reinduce trauma in their myofascial tissue.

      (the $10k slashdot post)
      (not all osteopaths are equally talented - that'll be another $500, please.

    • Re:Treatments? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by bladesjester ( 774793 ) <slashdot.jameshollingshead@com> on Thursday October 27, 2005 @02:41AM (#13887284) Homepage Journal
      In the case of most people here?

      Try to make your workspace more ergodynamic with an ergo keyboard, gel wrist pads, proper chair height, etc.

      In addition, get a set of chinese exercise balls (the solid kind, not the hollow kind. I have several sets made of marble that I give as gifts to fellow geeks) and use them every day. After a while, you will notice a positive change in the way that your wrists feel.
      • "get a set of chinese exercise balls (the solid kind, not the hollow kind. I have several sets made of marble that I give as gifts to fellow geeks)"

        um you know those arent exercise balls right?

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_wah_balls [wikipedia.org]

        Ben Wa balls are said to originate in Japan where they were called Rin No Tama ('tinkling bells') and were made either of metal or ivory. Originally they were a single ball placed in the vagina used to enhance the act of coitus, but shortly evolved into multiple metal covered

    • I dunno, my solution has always been to give it all up and open a dive shop in the Carribean.

      I'm just waiting for the real estate market to cool off, and my wife to stop laughing at me.

  • now get back to work
  • I think that all right-thinking people in this country are sick and
    tired of being told that ordinary decent people are fed up in this
    country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not. But I'm
    sick and tired of being told that I am.
  • They discovered that nerve injuries caused by low-force, highly repetitive work can be blamed on an onslaught of cytokines -- proteins that help start inflammation.

    Damn. No more browsing at -1 on slashdot, bye bye the source of the lowest, most evil filth in the world.

    Although I do hear piquepaille actually posted two stories that didn't hyperfuckernate his own blog! good ey. :D

    Tod.

    please type the word in this image: churned
    random letters - if you are visually impaired, please email us at pater@slashdot.org
  • I wonder if porn stars suffer from these repetitive motion syndromes?
    No doubt pr0n surfers probably do!

  • Why is this humor? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @07:15AM (#13887872) Homepage Journal
    Of course, it's a bit of a "Dr. Obvious" study:


    Abstract

    Subjects were instructed to hit their thumbs with a hammer. Electronic equipment measured the velocity, force, and frequency of the hits. All three parameters were found to decrease with time (c=0.8) and number of hits (0.99). Implications for carpentry are discussed in detail.


    What's interesting though, is that managers have a static view of people, as if they were components. Actually, they are systems with self-regulating behavior. Naturally, one of the things the system regulates is physical well being. But it would be interesting to try to quantify the effect of work on psychological well being.
    • I think Edward Bellamy nailed the problem in "Looking Backward." In essence we live in a completely insane world where working for a living is considered the lowest form of life. So we have to pay people to do the most unpleasent jobs. And if that were not enough, we compound the unpleasentness of the job by heaping on contempt.

      So you have 3 classes of people. The bosses. The chumps who have to do what the bosses do because they aren't as clever or powerful as the bosses. And finally the whores who are pa

  • Pinky: Gee, Brain, what are we going to do tonight?
    Brain: The same thing we do every night, Pinky - an eight hour shift of menial RSI inducing tasks!
    Pinky: "Narf!"
    Pinky: "Zort!"
    Pinky: "Poit!"
    [curls up in a ball and falls asleep]

    Seriously though, hardly rocket~surgery is it;
    injure mouse - mouse doesnt feel like working - mouse rests to recover injury

    Here's a thought, the mice might be sleeping between tasks because they're exhausted/bored out of they're tiny mouse minds??

  • If you are going to subject animals to pain and cruelty you should at least do it for some reasonable scientific purpose. This study is inane.

  • What sort of "work" were the rats doing? Programming? Is this the next wave in outsourcing -- giving work to another species?

    --Rob

  • I have rats, and let me tell you: they curl up into a ball and fall asleep at pretty much any time. Drink from water bottle, take a nap. Go get some food, take a nap. Vigorous grooming, then take a nap.

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