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According to one study, reducing teenagers' screen time for a week could alleviate sleep problems associated with electronic devices.
Devices such as smartphones, tablets and computers emit a blue light that affects our 24-hour biological clock, called the circadian rhythm, and explains how our brain decides when to sleep. Previous studies have shown close links between the use of such devices and the duration of sleep and sleep of adolescents.
The authors of the new study wanted to determine if teens would sleep better if they abandoned the technology before going to bed. A group of 55 Dutch teens aged 12 to 17 were classified as frequent users of the screen, four hours a day, and infrequent, one hour a day.
Over a period of five weeks, frequent users were asked to perform one of the following three tasks, separated by a wash period of one week. One week, they were asked to continue using their screen as usual; in another week, wear blue light-blocking glasses; and then not to use any screen at all. Infrequent users acted as a control group for the study. The study summary does not indicate at what time of the day participants start wearing blue light-blocking glasses.
Participants held sleep diaries, carried devices to measure their rest and activity cycles, and provided saliva samples on the last day of each week for scientists to measure their melatonin levels, a sleep hormone.
Teenagers who used devices often slept 30 minutes later on average and were more likely to wake up at night than lower-level users.
At the end of the study, teenagers who often used screens had a sleep of a similar quality to those who did not. They also woke up 20 minutes earlier on average and were less likely to experience symptoms of sleep deprivation.
The authors thought it might be because blue light did not have the chance to disrupt the production of melatonin, which regulates sleep. Next, the researchers want to study whether the effects could be lasting and reproduce in the adult.
The study is presented at the annual meeting of the European Society of Endocrinology, ECE 2019, to be held May 18-21, and has therefore not been published in a peer-reviewed journal.
Co-author of the study, Dirk Jan Stenvers, of the Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism of the UMC in Amsterdam, said: "Teens spend more and more time on devices with screens and sleep-related complaints are common in this age group.We show here simply the complaints can be easily corrected by minimizing the use of the screen at night or the exposure According to our data, it is likely that teenagers' complaints about sleep and their sleep delay are at least partly due to the blue light of the screens. "
In the long run, Stenvers said, a lack of sleep is associated with an increased risk of diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. "If we can now introduce simple measures to solve this problem, we can avoid new health problems in the coming years," he said.
Iroise Dumontheil, Reader in Cognitive Neuroscience at Birkbeck, University of London, and Researcher for the Study of Cognition, Adolescence and Mobile Phones, did not participate in the study but said the results are promising, even though they have not been peer reviewed. .
"The results suggest that wearing anti-blue-light glasses could reduce the impact of frequent screen use on teenagers' sleep," she said.
"What's particularly interesting is that wearing these glasses has had an effect similar to completely avoiding the use of the screen, allowing teens to fall asleep and wake up earlier. One caveat is that the study did not include an active control condition [for example, wearing another type of glasses]As a result, teenagers' expectations may have contributed to the results, "said Dumontheil.
This article has been updated to correct the spelling of the name of Dirk Jan Stenvers.
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