3Īs you can see, younger people tend to need more hours of sleep per night to help their brains develop. See the table below for the average hours of sleep you should be getting per night, depending on how old you are. Many factors determine how much sleep you need a night, one of them being your age. How many hours of sleep should we get a night? The result? Forcing your body to be alert and active at a time it should be asleep not only squeezes the time available for sleep, but it also triggers a stress response in the body that lowers the immune system, and puts a strain on the heart. Rolling news, 24-hour supermarkets, internet access whenever we like – all this continual activity is only possible thanks to artificial light, but it confuses our circadian rhythms. To find out exactly how and why our sleep has changed over the past 150 years, have a read of our article on the history of sleep.Īnything that upsets the 24-hour cycle, such as the clocks moving forwards or backwards, jet lag, shift work, or even just a very late night, can have a detrimental effect on our sleep patterns, which can sometimes lead to more serious sleep problems like insomnia.Įxperts also blame our 24-hour society for the increase in insomnia symptoms. Our body clock resets itself each day by using signals from external timekeepers, such as light and dark.įor example, when it gets dark at night, light-sensitive cells in our eyes send a message to our body clock causing it to inhibit the release of waking hormones cortisol and adrenaline, and increase the production of the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin.Įnvironmental factors like the amount of sunlight we get and blue light from the technology we use can greatly impact our body clock.Īs a nation, we are now sleeping later and less than ever before. It helps regulate our sleep and other functions such as our eating habits and body temperature. Known as the circadian rhythm, this internal body clock is controlled by a part of the brain called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) and it’s on automatic repeat every 24 hours. The food, drinks, and macronutrients we consume play a huge part in how well or badly we sleep. Poor sleep can also shorten your overall life expectancy making it very important to get those ZZZs in night after night. Whereas regularly experiencing poor sleep could put you at serious risk of health conditions like obesity, heart disease, anxiety, depression, diabetes, and high blood pressure.
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