You probably don’t feel well when you stay up late into the night. But beyond waking up groggy, late bedtimes can actually harm your mental health, new research says.
In a recently published studyPsychiatry Research, Experts analyzed sleep and health data from 73,888 people in the UK Biobank. Those who regularly went to bed after 1 a.m. were more likely to experience mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety than those who went to bed before 1 a.m.
It didn’t matter whether the subjects normally classified themselves as early birds or night owls (also known as chronotype); study found that going to bed after 1 a.m. harms people mentally. In fact, night owls who go to bed after 1 a.m. are likely to have negative effects on mental health. People who went to bed before 1 a.m. had the lowest rates of mental health diagnoses.
This study has some limitations: Dr., professor of medicine in the Department of Sleep Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. According to Indira Gurubhagavatula, the people who make up the UK Biobank are mostly white and middle-aged or older. is linked to the work.
“And the way they decided what chronotype you were came from a single question, although they used a validated question. But usually how we evaluate dressing gown or evening gown is through a much more comprehensive survey with much more detailed questions,” Gurubhagavatula said. So it may not be entirely accurate whether the people in this study were actually morning people or night owls.
The researchers also relied on mental health diagnostic data added by doctors. Such reported data may be inaccurate or doctors may miss a diagnosis, Gurubhagavatula said. However, he noted that the findings matched his expectations and said this study should be reproduced in other populations.
Sleeping late has many negative effects on your mental health and overall health.
“Generally speaking, if you don’t go to bed after 1 a.m. or 2 a.m., you likely won’t wake up until a few hours after sunrise. And you don’t go to bed for several hours after the sun goes down, so I think that creates this problem… the mismatch with the environmental light-dark cycle is potentially problematic,” said assistant professor Matthew Lehrer. from the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh, who was not affiliated with the study.
It is important that our body receives strong signals that it is daytime, which may come in the form of the morning sun. If you’re not receiving those signals or you’re getting mixed signals, that can cause problems with your biology, which can also affect your brain, Lehrer said.
“The authors also mentioned the existence of some brain-related mechanisms beyond circadian misalignment. More nocturnal activity is associated with more impulsive and maladaptive behavior,” Lehrer said. “There are some mechanisms in the brain that are involved in behavior, impulsivity, and inhibition… When you stay awake longer, those things tend to decrease, which can be associated with poor mental health.”
Gurubhagavatula noted that some brain functions are more sensitive to sleep loss than others.
“For example, maybe you can chew gum, you can talk, you can walk, but the frontal lobe of the brain is very vulnerable to sleep deprivation,” Gurubhagavatula said. The frontal lobe is responsible for many functions of our brain, including mood and emotional regulation.
“So our ability to not move wildly from one emotion to another (the ability to inhibit ourselves) is weakened under conditions of sleep deprivation or staying up too late at night,” Gurubhagavatula said. “Then that can lead to more negativity, more anxiety… because the higher brain functions that regulate those emotions are more blunted.”
What about people like shift workers who have to go to bed after 1 a.m.?
This can all sound pretty discouraging, especially if you have a job that requires you to go to bed after 1 a.m. Both experts said there are things you can do to minimize the negative impact of going to bed late and get more sleep.
Sleeping is the first step. “One type of napping, called a strategic nap, occurs when you know you’re having a slump during a shift where it’s so hard to stay awake that your eyes will close. If possible, it would be very productive to use this time to take a nap,” said Gurubhagavatula.
“And the other thing is this thing called preventive naps. So before the shift starts, you go into the shift as rested as possible,” Gurubhagavatula said. It’s best to keep your naps to 20 or 30 minutes.
Another strategy for night shift workers is to “expose appropriately timed exposure to bright light during work hours if possible,” Lehrer said. “This could be artificial light, like light boxes for individuals with seasonal affective disorder…they are very bright, they have properties that reduce fatigue and improve mood.”
It is also important to follow a specific nutrition program. “Maintaining more of a daytime-focused eating schedule could also potentially be beneficial for your mood, as shown by a simulated night shift study. People in the lab ate during the day and experienced better improvements in mood than those who ate at night,” Lehrer said.
Having a cool, dark, and quiet bedroom can also help you sleep better, according to both experts.
Beyond that, if you can’t get the recommended seven to nine hours of sleepGurubhagavatula said it’s important to be aware that you may have a sleep disorder. In this case, it’s a good idea to see a sleep specialist.
“I think most people are now starting to realize that even though we treat sleep like it’s a bonus, it’s actually very important. This is a biological imperative,” said Gurubhagavatula. “And just like air, food and water, we cannot do without it.”