Stanford Medicine researchers
recently concluded that insufficient night sleep hurts mental health. Their findings suggest that night owls should rethink their late-night habits. If you’ve made a habit of going to bed late, be it due to work, friend get-togethers, online browsing, or binge-watching movies, it may be time to rethink your routine.
In a groundbreaking survey involving nearly 75,000 adults, scientists have linked your sleep timing, or ‘chronotype,’ with your mental well-being. And guess what? It turns out that hitting the hay early might just be the secret sauce to keeping those mental health blues at bay.
Now, before you dismiss this as just another sleep study, let me tell you, this one’s a game-changer. Stanford’s finest compared the participants’ preferred snooze schedules with their actual Z’s. And what did they find? Whether you’re an early bird or a night owl, staying up late is a no-go if you want to keep your mind in tip-top shape.
But here’s the kicker: the study, published in Psychiatry Research, doesn’t just tell us to turn off the lights by 1 a.m.—it’s shaking up everything we thought we knew about our body clocks. “Alignment with your chronotype is not crucial here,” says Jamie Zeitzer, PhD, the brain behind the study. “It’s being up late that’s the troublemaker for your mental health.” And the million-dollar question is: why?
Renske Lok, PhD, the lead author, and her team didn’t expect to stumble upon this revelation. They previously believed that snoozing in sync with your natural rhythm was the key to longevity, especially after a study suggested that women with cancer who slept off-schedule had shorter lifespans.
So, they set out to crack the chronotype code in a larger crowd, focusing on middle-aged and older folks in the UK. Participants were quizzed about their sleep preferences and donned wearable accelerometers for a week to track their slumber. Mental health? Checked through health records, covering any disorder in the International Classification of Diseases.
Here’s where it gets juicy: the study sorted sleepers into early, late, and intermediate categories, based on the group’s overall behavior. This approach is gold because it accounts for different sleep norms across populations. “1 a.m. wouldn’t be that late for college students,” Zeitzer points out.
And now, for the twist no one saw coming: aligning with your chronotype isn’t the best bet for everyone’s mental health. In fact, night owls might be better off leading a misaligned life. “We tried to disprove it for six months, but we couldn’t,” Zeitzer recalls.
The data doesn’t lie—both morning and evening types who burned the midnight oil had higher rates of mental health disorders, including depression and anxiety. Night owls staying true to their late-night nature were up to 40% more likely to have a mental health diagnosis compared to their early-sleeping counterparts.
But what about morning larks? Can you compensate for insufficient night sleep by lingering in bed? Those who rose with the sun had the best mental health, which isn’t shocking. Yet, sleep duration and consistency didn’t explain these findings. And, to rule out the chicken-or-the-egg scenario, the team tracked participants without prior mental disorders for eight years. The result? Late-sleeping night owls were the most likely to develop mental health issues down the line.
So, what’s the deal with sleep timing and mental health? Zeitzer believes it boils down to the questionable choices people make in the wee hours. Harmful behaviors like suicidal thoughts, violence, and substance abuse are more common at night. The “mind after midnight” hypothesis suggests that late-night brain changes could lead to impulsivity and risky decisions.
And here’s a thought to chew on: the evening person up at 3 a.m. might think they’re on top of the world, making stellar decisions. But morning people, out of their element at that hour, might be more aware that their brains aren’t firing on all cylinders, potentially dodging poor choices.
Could social factors play a role? Perhaps. With fewer people around at night, especially in places like the US and UK, social constraints loosen. But in more social night cultures, like the Mediterranean, burning the midnight oil could actually be a mental health booster.
Zeitzer’s advice to night owls is clear: hit the sack before 1 a.m. But changing habits is tough, and while morning sunlight and a consistent routine can shift sleep patterns, they won’t change your chronotype. It’s like a rubber band, ready to snap back to its original shape at the first chance.
The Stanford team isn’t done yet. They’re on a mission to find out if it’s the late-night activities themselves, rather than the timing, that are the culprits of poor mental health. “If you’re doing what people normally do at 10 p.m. but at 2 or 3 a.m., maybe that’s not a problem,” Zeitzer muses.
Funded by the Mental Illness Research Education and Clinical Center, the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs, and a Stanford University School of Medicine award program, this study is just the tip of the iceberg. We’ve covered other sleep news and sleep facts as well. In this particular case, the takeaway is simple: If you’re a night owl and get insufficient night sleep, it might be time to rethink your nocturnal lifestyle for the sake of your mental health. A good night’s sleep could be the best medicine for your mind.