Michael Field
A large chunk of the globe – and most of the world two centuries ago – squatted.
Surprising little in the way of research has gone into the science involved in squatting versus sitting.
The best I could do on the topic is a paper from the University of Wollongong in Australia. Four researchers put their names to a learned journal article, “Squatting for the Prevention of Haemorrhoids?”
Western industrialisation, they say, has changed toilet habits.
”The traditional posture was squatting, and this remains the method used by most of the world’s population,” the paper says.
“It is only in the past hundred years or so that use of the pedestal toilet has become common in Europe, North America and a few other places.”
They say there has been remarkably little medical investigation into this topic.
What little was done suggested squatting was better for people.
“Even if squatting for defecation was accepted as having health benefits, it would be no simple matter to promote this alternative,” the Wollongong study says.
“Anal functions are largely taboo topics in western societies, at least in the modern era.”
The second problem was that even if it was better for people, the “pedestal toilet is well and truly entrenched in most western societies…. As well as the enormous and expensive infrastructure of existing toilets, people’s habits are deeply ingrained.”
For people over time, their muscles have changed and after a life time of a pedestal, a squatting toilet might be too hard.
“On the other hand, many young and middle-aged people retain good muscle tone and have no problem squatting.”
Cornell University’s Professor Alexander Kira, in his book The Bathroom, carefully studied the question.
“Virtually every physician and physiologist who has ever troubled to write on the subject agrees that there is a natural and physiologically sound posture that encourages the defecation process,” he said, pointing to squatting.
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Read the full study