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Insomnia smartphone

Smartphone insomnia: Why checking your phone before bed spoils your
sleep
<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/smartphone-insomnia-why-checking-your-phone-
before-bed-spoils-your-sleep/>

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Jacqueline Snowden By Jacqueline Snowden

<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/author/jacqueline-snowden/> 10 months
ago

Insomnia smartphone

Most of us experience insomnia at some point in our lives, finding it

difficult to drift off and stay asleep despite having plenty of
opportunity to. Typical causes of insomnia include stress and anxiety,
but did you know that your gadgets could be to blame, too?

Our sleepiness and wakefulness throughout the day and night is regulated
by our circadian rhythm. This is essentially our body clock, creating
physical, mental and behavioural changes that occur in our bodies over a
roughly 24-hour cycle. Circadian rhythms are found in most living
things, including animals, plants and many tiny microbes, and are
created by natural factors in the body. However, they also respond to
signals from the environment, such as light, so that we remain in sync
with the Earths rotation.

All forms of light, both natural and artificial, affect our body clock,
as when the photosensitive retinal ganglion cells in our eyes detect
light, they send this information to the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN)
the group of nerves in the brain that controls circadian rhythms. When
light is detected, the SCN will delay the production of melatonin, a
hormone that sends us to sleep. However, the retinal ganglion cells have
been found to be particularly sensitive to the blue light with a short
wavelength of 480 nanometres emitted by most computer, smartphone and
tablet screens. Exposure to a lot of this type of light in the hours
before we go to bed has been proven to suppress melatonin levels, making
it difficult for us to get to sleep.

How light affects your ability to sleep

How light affects your ability to sleep

Blocking blue light

The best way to reduce your exposure to blue light is to avoid staring
at a screen in the two hours before you go to bed. Instead illuminate
the room with the warmer longer-wavelength light from regular
incandescent bulbs or even candles.

However, if you just cant resist staring at your computer or phone

before bed, then there are ways that you can do so and still get a good
nights sleep. Wearing special glasses with amber-coloured lenses will
filter out blue, low-wavelength light, allowing you to stare at your
screen for as long as you like. Companies such as Uvex
(uvex-safety.co.uk) make blue-blocking glasses and goggles in a range of
styles. Alternatively, you could use computer software such as f.lux
(justgetflux.com) and smartphone apps such as Twilight (play.google.
com) that automatically adjusts your screen to filter out blue light
between sunset and sunrise, replacing it with a softer red light.

Sleeping records

*Shortest *

Giraffes require less sleep than any other mammal, typically getting
20-30 minutes per day for five minutes at a time.

*Average *

The amount of sleep we need varies from person to person, but we

typically require about eight hours per night.

*Longest *

Koalas are some of the heaviest sleepers, clocking up approximately 15

hours of snoozing per day.

Discover more amazing science in the latest issue of *How It

Works. *Its available from all good retailers, or you can order it
online from the ImagineShop
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tablet or smartphone, you can also download the digital version
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Can you have too much sleep?

<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/question-of-the-day-can-you-have-too-much-sleep/>

Why do we feel sleepy after eating?

<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/why-do-we-feel-sleepy-after-eating/>

How does alcohol affect sleep?

<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/how-does-alcohol-affect-sleep/>

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tags: brain <https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/brain/>, insomnia

<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/insomnia/>, light
<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/light/>, screen
<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/screen/>, sleep
<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/sleep/>, smartphone
<https://www.howitworksdaily.com/tag/smartphone/>

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