Watching TV, reading a tablet, or watching your phone before bedtime could be harmful to your health.
Watching a bright screen at night affects one of the hormones, melatonin, that helps induce sleep sleep. A screen’s light can delay the production of this hormone, disturbing your body’s natural sleep pattern that night. How many times do you check the latest news or Facebook before bedtime? The light from a smartphone, tablet or TV tricks the brain into thinking it is still daytime, when your body should really be preparing for a night’s rest.
The result: less overall sleep, a lower quality of sleep and sleepiness and fatigue the next day. Even with eight hours of rest, watching electronic screens could disrupt your sleep and contribute to the sleepiness some of us feel on a regular basis.
Recommendations vary for helping preserve melatonin production, but a general consensus is to hold off on looking at screens one to three hours bedtime. If that is impossible, use available phone apps to suppress the amount of blue light given off by your electronics, as well as the program F.lux for your computers. More, and better quality, sleep could be in your future.
If you think you might have a more serious sleep disorder, visit a Hartford HealthCare Sleep Care Center.