Bedroom-Invading Smartphones Jumble Body’s Sleep Rhythms. Having trouble sleeping? Check for a glow, inches from the pillow. Using a smartphone, tablet or laptop at bedtime may be staving off sleep, according to Harvard Medical School scientists, who have found specific wavelengths of light can suppress the slumber-inducing hormone melatonin in the brain. “We have biologically shifted ourselves so we can’t fall asleep earlier,” said Charles A. Czeisler, a professor of sleep medicine at Harvard Medical School. The result is less sleep -- and less time for the body to recover. In the U.S. alone, revenue from clinics treating sleep disorders expanded 12 percent annually from 2008 to 2011, reaching $6 billion, according to IBISWorld. “Sleep is in a battle for our time with work life, social life and family life,” said David Hillman, a sleep specialist at the Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth, Western Australia, and the chairman of the Sleep Health Foundation.
Many Gadgets Modern technology isn’t helping. Body’s Rhythm Night Owls Digital Bedmate. Teen Sleep Affected By Friends, Parents: Study. Teens' relationships with their parents, as well as their social lives, may affect sleep more than previously realized, according to a new study in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior. Researchers at the University of Cincinnati found that teens whose parents keep a tighter leash on them are more likely to get adequate sleep each night. "Research shows that parents who keep tabs on their kids are less likely to see them get into trouble or use drugs and alcohol," study researcher David J. Maume, a sociology professor at the university, said in a statement. "My findings suggest a similar dynamic with sleep.
Parents who monitor their children's behavior are more likely to have kids that get adequate rest. In addition, teens whose friends are positive and care about school are more likely to get more, and higher quality, shut-eye, the researchers found. Almost 1,000 teens from the Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development were examined from age 12 to 15 for the research. The myth of the eight-hour sleep. Image copyright Other We often worry about lying awake in the middle of the night - but it could be good for you. A growing body of evidence from both science and history suggests that the eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.
In the early 1990s, psychiatrist Thomas Wehr conducted an experiment in which a group of people were plunged into darkness for 14 hours every day for a month. It took some time for their sleep to regulate but by the fourth week the subjects had settled into a very distinct sleeping pattern. They slept first for four hours, then woke for one or two hours before falling into a second four-hour sleep. Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists. In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a seminal paper, drawn from 16 years of research, revealing a wealth of historical evidence that humans used to sleep in two distinct chunks.
Image copyright bbc. Why sleep disruptions could be fatal. Consequences of too little, too much or endless nights of broken sleep are very serious, new research has suggested. Most experts believe that between six and eight hours is the right amount for an adult. Teenagers need about nine hours a night and young babies up to 16 hours a day.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania studied nearly 140,000 people and found adults on fewer than six hours a night were up to 36 per cent more likely to suffer a heart attack and 22 per cent more at risk of a stroke than those who got a good night’s rest, the Daily Express reported. Another Japanese study found those regularly sleeping fewer than six hours a night raised their risk of a breast tumour by more than 60 per cent. Scientists believe sleep disruption interferes with the production of a vital hormone called melatonin, which is thought to suppress the release of oestrogen, another hormone implicated in a significant proportion of breast cancers. Lack of sleep linked to mental illness.
Last updated 05:00 26/03/2011 It is one of our most basic functions, as important as the in and out of our breath. Our need for sleep is primal, yet the pace of life means it's often pushed to the periphery, sacrificed at the altar of work, friends, study and fun. But now science is beginning to show that getting the right amount of sleep might be the key to making the rest of our lives run more smoothly. Increasingly, research is indicating that the quality and quantity of our sleep affects every part of our lives, from success in work and school to our likelihood of developing problems such as obesity or mental illness. Writing in the journal Frontiers in Neurology last year, American researchers highlighted the growing body of research confirming that students who have insomnia, inadequate sleep, daytime sleepiness, irregular sleep patterns or poor sleep quality do not perform as well in school as others.
If you sleep for much less than 8¼ hours a day, you may not be getting enough. Better Sleep Is Associated With Improved Academic Success. Getting more high-quality sleep is associated with better academic performance, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Wednesday, June 10, at SLEEP 2009, the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies.
The positive relationship is especially relevant to performance in math. Results indicate that higher math scores were related to greater sleep quality, less awakenings and increased sleep efficiency. Higher English and history scores were associated with less difficulty awakening. Increased sleep-onset latency over the weekend was associated with worse academic performance.
According to principal investigator Jennifer C. Cousins, PhD, postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, it was surprising that although more and better sleep produced overall improvements, different types of sleep measures were related to different types of functioning. Sleep makes your memories stronger, and helps with creativity. As humans, we spend about a third of our lives asleep. So there must be a point to it, right? Scientists have found that sleep helps consolidate memories, fixing them in the brain so we can retrieve them later. Now, new research is showing that sleep also seems to reorganize memories, picking out the emotional details and reconfiguring the memories to help you produce new and creative ideas, according to the authors of an article in Current Directions in Psychological Science. "Sleep is making memories stronger," says Jessica D. Payne and Kensinger study what happens to memories during sleep, and they have found that a person tends to hang on to the most emotional part of a memory.
"In our fast-paced society, one of the first things to go is our sleep," Payne says. Payne has taken the research to heart. As humans, we spend about a third of our lives asleep. "Sleep is making memories stronger," says Jessica D. Payne has taken the research to heart. Fragmented sleep 'harms memory' 25 July 2011Last updated at 22:20 Continuous sleep is important for memory formation Broken sleep affects the ability to build memories, a study of mice suggests. The Proceedings of the National Academy of Science findings could help explain memory problems linked to conditions including Alzheimer's and sleep apnoea. The Stanford University research found disrupting sleep made it harder for the animals to recognise familiar objects.
A UK sleep expert said the brain used deep sleep to evaluate the day's events and decide what to keep. This study looked at sleep that was fragmented, but not shorter or less intense than normal for the mice. It used a technique called optogenetics, where specific cells are genetically engineered so they can be controlled by light. They targeted a type of brain cell that plays a key role in switching between the states of being asleep and being awake. Mouse memory test The researchers then sent light pulses directly into the brains of mice while they slept. Extended Or Shortened Sleep Duration Linked To Weight Gain.
Body Mass Index (BMI) varies as a function of habitual sleep duration, according to a research abstract that will be presented on June 11, at Sleep 2009, the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies. Results indicate that twins who slept between 7 and 8.9 hours each night had a lower mean BMI (25.0 kg/m2) compared to those who regularly slept either more (25.2 kg/m2) or less (26.4 kg/m2) per night. The relationship between sleep duration and BMI remained after controlling for genetics and shared environment. According to the lead author of the story, Nathaniel Watson, MD, co-director at the University of Washington Sleep Institute, in Seattle, sleep habits have a significant impact on weight and BMI. "Findings of the study point towards an environmental cause of the relationship between sleep duration and BMI," said Watson.
Abstract Title: Does Sleep Duration Influence Body Mass Index in Twins? Napping may help with blood pressure management. A daytime sleep could have cardiovascular benefits according to new research by Ryan Brindle and Sarah Conklin, PhD, from Allegheny College in Pennsylvania in the US. Their study, looking at the effect of a daytime nap on cardiovascular recovery following a stress test, found that those participants who slept for at least 45 minutes during the day had lower average blood pressure after psychological stress than those who did not sleep. Long work schedules, shift work, increased anxiety and a greater use of the internet and television late at night -- all characteristics of our modern society -- have had an impact on nocturnal sleep.
We no longer sleep as long as we used to: The average sleep duration is now almost 2 hours shorter per night than it was 50 years ago. And this could be impacting our long-term health. For example, sleeping less has been linked to an increased risk of hypertension and cardiovascular problems generally. Poor Sleep Is Associated With Lower Relationship Satisfaction In Both Women And Men. A bidirectional association exists between couples' sleep quality and the quality of their relationship, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Wednesday, June 10, at SLEEP 2009, the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies.
Results indicate that on a day to day basis, couples' relationship quality affects their sleep, and their sleep also affects their subsequent relationship functioning. For men, better sleep (as indicated by diary–based sleep efficiency) was associated with more positive ratings of relationship quality the next day.
For women, negative partner interactions during the day were associated with poorer sleep efficiency for both themselves and their partner that night. The study involved data from 29 heterosexual, co-sleeping couples who did not have children. Hasler said that interventions directed at improving either quality of sleep or relationships may provide overall benefits, as the two directly impact each other. Study Shows A Bidirectional Relationship Between Chronic Stress And Sleep Problems. People with chronic stress report shorter sleep duration, worse sleep quality, and more daytime functioning impairments, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Wednesday, June 10, at SLEEP 2009, the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies.
Conversely, daytime functioning impairments and shorter sleep duration demonstrated a predictive relationship with habitual stress complaints. Results indicate that poor sleep may be a potential cause of stress; individuals who report more fatigue and less total sleep are more likely to report more stress. According to principal investigator Eric Powell, PhD, director of research at the Research Center at Clayton Sleep Institute in St.
Louis, Mo., factors that were the best predictors of high stress were daytime functioning and typical amount of sleep. The study involved data from 544 patients at the Midwestern metropolitan sleep center who received diagnostic polysomnograms. Apnea may be cause for awakening and voiding for those with enlarged prostates. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers have shown that a significant number of patients with benign prostate enlargement (BPE) may have Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), which may be the reason for their night awakenings and urination. This study compared men between the ages of 55 and 75 years-old, who were randomly sampled from primary care clinics, diagnosed with BPE and reported nocturia at least once nightly. The comparison control group had no BPE and one or no nocturia episodes per night.
According to the new study published in the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, the BGU researchers found that more than half (57.8 percent) of patients with enlarged prostates may in fact have the sleep disorder, and that the awakenings that patients ascribed to their need to urinate at night may be actually caused by their sleep disorders. Waking during the night to void, known as "nocturia" is a common BPE symptom.
Later Parental-mandated Bedtimes For Teens Linked To Depression And Suicidal Thoughts. Earlier parental-mandated bedtimes could help protect teens from depression and suicidal thoughts by lengthening sleep duration, according to a research abstract that will be presented on June 9, at Sleep 2009, the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies. The study by James Gangwisch, PhD, of Columbia University in New York, examined data from 15,659 adolescents. A total of 1,143 teens (7.3 percent) suffered from depression and 2,038 (13 percent) had suicidal thoughts. Adolescents with parental-mandated bedtimes at midnight or later were 25 percent more likely to suffer from depression and 20 percent more likely to have suicidal ideation compared with adolescents who had parental-mandated bedtimes of 10 p.m. or earlier.
"It is a common perception and societal expectation that adolescents do not need as much sleep as preadolescents, yet studies suggests that adolescents may actually require more sleep," said Gangwisch. Collecting your thoughts: You can do it in your sleep! It is one thing to learn a new piece of information, such as a new phone number or a new word, but quite another to get your brain to file it away so it is available when you need it.
A new study published in the Journal of Neuroscience by researchers at the University of York and Harvard Medical School suggests that sleep may help to do both. The scientists found that sleep helps people to remember a newly learned word and incorporate new vocabulary into their "mental lexicon. " During the study, which was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, researchers taught volunteers new words in the evening, followed by an immediate test. The volunteers slept overnight in the laboratory while their brain activity was recorded using an electroencephalogram, or EEG. A test the following morning revealed that they could remember more words than they did immediately after learning them, and they could recognise them faster demonstrating that sleep had strengthened the new memories. Sleep deprivation eliminates fear generalization: New way to treat PTSD?
People who sleep less catch more colds.