One in three adults report some sort of insomnia and around half of those say it disrupts their functioning in the day.
A big culprit of sleep disturbances is — lying on your back in bed, bathed in the white light of the internet.
A new study has found an hour of screen use in bed increases your risk of insomnia by 59% and lowers sleep duration by an average of 24 minutes per night.
The data is the latest showing that being on your or laptop before bed has a negative effect on sleep habits.
This evidence is strongest in teenagers but the new study, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry, finds it’s also the case in young adults.
Screen use in bed disrupts sleep quality
The researchers used data from the Norwegian 2022 Student’s Health and Wellbeing survey, which included data from more than 45,000 adults aged 18-28.
They asked participants about their screen use behaviors before bed, the internet content they used and their sleep quality.
They found any use of screens disrupted people’s . It didn’t matter what type of content they browsed.
Social media, for example, wasn’t any more disruptive than other screen activities like watching shows or movies, gaming, surfing the internet or listening to audio.
“The type of screen activity does not appear to matter as much as the overall time spent using screens in bed,” said study lead author Gunnhild Johnsen Hjetland from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health.
“We found no significant differences between social media and other screen activities, suggesting that screen use itself is the key factor in sleep disruption — likely due to time displacement, where screen use delays sleep by taking up time that would otherwise be spent resting,” Hjetland said.
Cut down screen time before sleep
The authors suggest cutting screen time before sleeping can increase the quality of your sleep.
“If you struggle with sleep and suspect that screen time may be a factor, try to reduce screen use in bed, ideally stopping at least 30 to 60 minutes before sleep. If you do use screens, consider disabling notifications to minimize disruptions during the night,” said Hjetland.
Sleep disturbances strongly impact quality of life and are a major driver of .
Studies show people who didn’t get enough sleep are more likely to show symptoms of anxiety and depression.
Sleeping is optimum for brain function during the day. Sleep is important for learning and good cognitive function with research showing ‘all-nighters’ have a bad effect on school test scores.
How does screen use impact sleep?
Simply put, screen time in bed replaces the time spent resting or sleeping. But notifications and vibrations can also wake you up just as you’re nodding off — so best to put your phone on ‘do not disturb.’
But the common belief that blue light emitted from your phone tricks the body into thinking it’s time to wake up isn’t quite right.
Blue light emitted from phones does not? affect circadian rhythms any more than other light wavelengths. What’s more impactful is the brightness of the light and duration of exposure.
Glasses or apps that block blue light on your phone or laptop don’t necessarily improve sleep — what’s more effective is turning down the brightness or reducing screen time.
And the type of internet content you view before sleep is also important. Studies show that watching scary movies or viewing disturbing social media content triggers the release of stress hormones, which interferes with restful sleep, reducing deep and REM sleep.
If you want to relax your mind and body before sleeping, it’s best to nod off with a book or an e-reader without a screen light. Some studies show reading before going to sleep improves sleep quality.
Edited by: Matthew Ward Agius
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