Students could get more sleep and learn better if school started a little later

Joanna Fong-Isariyawongse, University of Pittsburgh (from The Conversation) Nearly three-quarters of high school students do not get enough sleep on school nights, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The National Sleep Foundation recommends that teens sleep for eight to 10 hours per night. But various factors hinder this, including early school start times and shifts in adolescents’ circadian rhythms – the biological…

See more

Sleep, health, and race/ethnicity

Sleep is inextricably tied to our health. Getting enough sleep, the amount of uninterrupted sleep, how deeply we sleep. Are our sleep patterns tied to race, gender, how we are treated, where we live, etc.–social as well as biological factors? What does the research say? This is an update to The importance of sleep and its impacts (physical and mental health) bibliography; for the most…

See more

Lack of sleep linked to cardiovascular problems

We know that sleep is vital for humans. Lack of sleep, sleep disruption, changes in sleep habits, and more can lead to real problems–physical and mental. For example, we know that not getting enough sleep leads to millions of lost work days and a huge annual economic loss … a problem especially severe in the United States. And, we know that sleep disruption and lack…

See more

The importance of sleep and its impacts (physical and mental health)

Quick bibliography: Reviews/recent articles on the importance of adequate sleep for good physical and mental health. Classic reviews: Dewald, J. F., Meijer, A. M., Oort, F. J., Kerkhof, G. A., & Bögels, S. M. (2010). The influence of sleep quality, sleep duration and sleepiness on school performance in children and adolescents: A meta-analytic review. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 14(3), 179-189. [Cited by] “Insufficient sleep, poor sleep…

See more

Science highlights: insomnia, and maternal mortality

Sleeplessness is a big problem today; its costs from health problems to lost productivity are huge. Recent research has probed the biological basis of insomnia. From analysis of the genomes of over 1.75 million people, insomnia has been potentially linked to hundreds of genes, specific brain regions, and an overlap with mood disorders (depression, anxiety, etc.). Read the article (Simon Makin, Scientific American, 12 March…

See more
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.