The IAA One Minute Blog

Sleep and how it affects peoples’ health has been making headlines. See what researchers have to say about sleep.

Sleep Impacts Emotions

Staying up late, sleeping too little or waking up often can impact a person's emotional health, according to a new analysis that spans decades of sleep research.

All of the 154 studies that the researchers used involved studying participants overnight while evaluating different ways people can lose sleep. Techniques used were:

• Keeping people awake for extended periods of time
• Periodically awakening them through the night
• Waking them up earlier than usual

Researchers looked for how these changes in sleep affected people’s emotions, as well as the impact on mood.

By combining data for the more than 5,700 people in all the studies, researchers found that reductions in sleep:

• Diminished the ability to express emotions
• Increased anxiety symptoms
• Reduced positive emotions

The more sleep the person lost, the greater the emotional toll.

Participants in the study were generally healthy and ranged in age from 7 years to 79 years old.

The research appeared in the American Psychological Association journal, “Psychological Bulletin.” 

Hitting the Snooze Button

Research has found no evidence that snoozing past your morning alarm has negative effects on sleep and cognitive processes. Instead, snoozing may help regular snoozers’ waking process.

The research included two studies. The first observed the waking habits of 1,732 adults, 69 percent of whom reported using the snooze function or setting multiple alarms at least some of the time.  In this group, snoozing ran from 1 to 180 minutes, with an average of 22 minutes spent snoozing per morning. Researchers also found snoozers tended to be younger than non-snoozers and identified themselves as evening types more than morning people.

The second study focused on the sleeping and waking patterns of 31 regular snoozers. After 30 minutes of snoozing, researchers found this group lost about six minutes of sleep but did not find clear effects on stress hormone levels, morning tiredness, mood, or overnight sleep quality. For some, snoozing also improved cognitive performance once awake, as compared to waking up immediately.

The research was published in the “Journal of Sleep Research.”

What IAA has to Say

Insurance Administrator of America knows sleep is important to everyone’s health. IAA hopes that everyone gets a good night’s sleep!