Chair becomes personalized posture coach

Researchers in the heartland are developing a device that may achieve what our mothers couldn’t—getting us to sit up straight.

Purdue University researcher Lynne A. Slivovsky sits in a chair that detects posture. She holds pressure-sensitive material like that covering the chair. David Umberger/Purdue

The prototype apparatus is an office chair fitted with a pressure-sensitive blanket. A computer analyzes pressure data from the blanket’s sensors.