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Increased Smartphone Screen-Time Is Associated With Lower Sleep Quality, Says Study (medicalxpress.com)
A new study from the University of California is the latest to show that increased smartphone screen-time can lower one's quality of sleep, which can lead to various negative health conditions such as obesity, diabetes and depression. Medical Xpress reports: Christensen and colleagues sought to test the hypothesis that increased screen-time may be associated with poor sleep by analyzing data from 653 adult individuals across the United States participating in the Health eHeart Study. Participants installed a smartphone application which recorded their screen-time, defined as the number of minutes in each hour that the screen was turned on, over a 30-day period. They also recorded their sleeping hours and sleep quality. The researchers found that each participant totaled an average of 38.4 hours over this period, with smartphones being activated on average for 3.7 minutes in each hour. Longer average screen-time was associated with poor sleep quality and less sleep overall, particularly when smartphones were used near participants' bedtime. The authors state that their study is the first to measure smartphone exposure prospectively, but caution that the study also had some important limitations, including the self-selection of study participants and self-reporting of data. The study has been published in the journal PLOS ONE.
I don't need sleep, I have an app do it.
Table-ized A.I.
If you RTFA, you'll find one HUGE get-out clause saying "These findings cannot support conclusions on causation. Effect-cause remains a possibility: poor sleep may lead to increased screen-time"
Meaning if people have a poor night's sleep, they may be spending more time on their phone BECAUSE THEY ARE AWAKE.
I wonder how much these geniuses spent to work out yet another statement of the bleeding obvious?
Good night everyone.
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Since when Samsung introduced the Galaxy Note 7, people are kept constantly awake by explosion noise!
(As I read this on my mobile, while awake in bed at 2am...)
This just in: Insomniacs do more things with the things they own when they can't sleep.
A new study shows: Insomniacs do more things with the things they own while not sleeping.
I write some great code during fitful sleep!
I think in general over consumption is a human weakness for many. We many times think of addiction as being from a addictive drug or someone addicted to alcohol. But technology to some seems addictive, and the increasing need for constant connections, quick response and a lack of common sense. Is driving people to do stupid things, like texting, talking while driving, avoiding face to face communication, and trying to live lives through apps and devices. Has it really helped our lives, or just made us more accessible and gives others the ability to this instant access society.
During some health/hormonal issues I started paying attention to my sleep too. I absolutely feel it is vital to being productive. (Everybody's mileage may vary, obviously.)
I've become a big fan of screen reddening apps, incandescent/warm-white light sources, and wearing yellow/orange glasses some hours before bedtime - all the general melatonin-killing blue light avoidance being punted for years now.
What people do seem to often miss however, is the thing about timing. Melatonin is produced only for a certain window period during the early evening. Trudging on through that window period by forcing yourself to stay awake, makes me unable to fall asleep later on, no matter how tired. So no late-night reading or surfing past bedtime, no matter how thrilling the novel or how .... uhmmm... interesting american election memes, how compelling the conversation, or how urgent the deadline. The corollary of this is that one has to work out a good bed-time routine and stick to it 7 days a week.
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Post hoc ergo propter hoc!
Nothing in the article says screen time can lower one's quality of sleep!! That is entirely the hasty conclusion of the editor here.
Perhaps people who are up with isomnia turn to their phones?!?
If the study extends to the larger screens on laptops and computers in general? I don't think so.
So you would rather have them throw a sensational conclusion instead of telling you the thruth? I decided to write a comment about how this study doesn't proove causality, because most studies (or the journalistic interpretation) usually ends with a baseless conclusion, but it seems like this study had integrity enough to say it like it is, so that I didn't have to put out any rant this time.
It is a valid data set, which can be used in combination with further studies. It's easy to observe that it's not without consequences to use a smartphone. It might not cause bad sleep, but it certainly doesn't make it better. You can't use the study to disprove a correlation just because it makes you feel better about your obsessive smartphone abuse.
Blue light stimulates wakefulness, is produced by LCDs, and the obsessions powering the social media craze prompt frequent and long exposure. That is causation.
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Of course the causation runs in both directions here.
It's likely that poor sleep leads to poorer function; it's likely that poorer function leads to stress, anxiety, and more screen time; and its likely that this in turns contributes to poor sleep. All three "likelies" have support within the existing literature.
Which doesn't stop a likely threesome from coming out upside down.
The next study requires an even larger budget. But first, you're probably going to do a cheap study to at least suggest that the two effects move in the same direction, once any kind of measurement enters the room.
Doh! they're so stupid for looking before they leap.
My phone doesn't make me depressed. I stare at my phone all night because I *am* depressed.
They give the observed averages, but nothing about how it varies from person to person, or with usage habits. Like a reading with unspecified error.
John_Chalisque
This is my cousin who researched this! Very proud.
Okay we get it, blue light fucks up sleep quality, we get it. We don't need the same fucking fluff piece click bait bullshit story repeated week after week. Sheesh.
So why don't we ever hear about the effect of LCD TVs on sleep? Surely a 60" TV blazing at you for hours is worse than a 6" screen.
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It's not actually surprising to see why this might be true if you look at this link, which explains that blue light suppresses secretion of melatonin and interferes with sleep. And I doubt everyone installs Twilight or CF.lumen on their phone if it's Android, and previous versions of iOS didn't have Night Mode if I remember correctly.
...about Television and Computer monitors.
FTA:
...particularly when smartphones were used near participants' bedtime.
Uh, yeah. That information has been known for decades. The amount of brain activity, light color and intensity, and distance of device from sleeping space (disassociation of device activity with sleep area) are known causes of trouble getting to sleep and maintaining a healthy sleep pattern. Unsure what this is supposed to be telling us that was previously unknown.
TFS says that the participants averaged 38.4 hours of sleep over 30 days. That's just over one hour per night. I don't think so. Either there's a major typo in TFS or whoever wrote up the study is missing a very obvious error.
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This story is rubbish. Send from my iPhone, 2:06am .