How To Sleep Better Without Meds: Soak In More Daylight Outdoors, Even If It’s Cloudy By John Anderer for Natural Blaze
It’s a popular question among tired Americans: How can I sleep better without turning to medicine? The answer could be on the other side of your front door. Getting outside for at least a little while and soaking in some daytime light, even when it’s cloudy, can help us sleep soundly at night, new research from the University of Washington suggests.
Scientists measured the sleep patterns of UW undergrad students, observing that they tended to fall asleep especially late and wake up later in the morning during winter. Of course, that’s a time when when daylight hours on the UW Seattle campus are usually limited and the skies stay overcast.
Collected data confirmed that the observed students weren’t getting nearly as much daylight during winter in comparison to other seasons. Study authors theorize this is why they slept less. Numerous earlier studies have indicated that lack of daylight exposure can lead to restlessness come bedtime.
Now is your chance to support Gospel News Network.
We love helping others and believe that’s one of the reasons we are chosen as Ambassadors of the Kingdom, to serve God’s children. We look to the Greatest Commandment as our Powering force.
“Our bodies have a natural circadian clock that tells us when to go to sleep at night,” says senior author Horacio de la Iglesia, a UW professor of biology, in a statement. “If you do not get enough exposure to light during the day when the sun is out, that ‘delays’ your clock and pushes back the onset of sleep at night.”
Wrist monitors were used to gauge both sleep patterns and light exposure among 507 undergrad students between 2015 and 2018. That data indicated students were getting about the same amount of sleep daily regardless of the season. However, on school days during the winter, participants went to bed an average of 35 minutes later and woke up 27 minutes later than summer school days. Study authors admit they were surprised by their findings, especially considering Seattle is a high-latitude city that enjoys close to 16 hours of sunlight on the summer solstice, over eight hours of sunlight on the winter solstice, and plenty of year-round evening light and nightlife.
“We were expecting that in the summer students would be up later due to all the light that’s available during that season,” Prof. de la Iglesia adds.
