“Shutting off the lights at night is a good place to start if you want to improve your cognitive health.“
By Xuan Truong Nguyen (Admin)
Everybody has an internal clock that controls their circadian rhythms, which include their sleep and wake cycles. And when it comes to determining when we should feel awake (which is usually during the day) and drowsy (which is usually at night), light is the single most significant influence.
Now allow me to pose a private query to you: how dark is your bedroom? Continue reading to see why that matters and whether it makes sense to sleep with an eye mask on.
Table of Contents
How Light Affects Sleep Quality and Circadian Rhythm
Our circadian rhythm developed long before artificial lighting. A few watts of power may fool the brain into thinking it is daytime at any time of night, as anyone who has visited Times Square will attest. What’s lighting up your bedroom, then?
- Watching a movie on a tablet in bed at night is more than 100 times brighter than being outside under a full moon.
- It is approximately ten times brighter to work on or watch a computer screen at night than it is to stand in a well-lit parking lot.
The natural mechanisms that aid in getting the body ready for sleep are impacted by light exposure at night. More specifically, your pineal gland releases melatonin when it gets dark. This hormone has a crucial role in the circadian rhythm of sleep.
What Happens at Night When We Are Exposed to Light: Impact on Sleep Quality
Our sleep rhythms are disrupted by light exposure at night, which suppresses melatonin production. Adults who slept near to a night light experienced shorter sleep and more frequent arousals than those who did not. Even artificial nighttime light from the outdoors, such street lamps, has been connected to poorer sleep.
However, the effects of nighttime light extend beyond sleep. It also raises the risk of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and the onset of depressive symptoms. Scientists believe that shift work exposes people to light exposure that is out of sync with our circadian cycles, which are defined as being dark during the day and light at night. This could lead to major health issues.
Eye Mask Benefits: Is It Possible to Use an Eye Mask to Improve Sleep Quality?
In order to determine whether using an eye mask while sleeping at night could enhance specific learning and alertness metrics, researchers from Cardiff University in the United Kingdom ran a number of tests.
Approximately ninety-nine young adults, aged 18 to 35, who were in good health, alternated between sleeping at night with an eye mask on or without light exposure. They kept a sleep diary where they noted their sleeping habits.
Participants in the first portion of the study spent a week wearing an undamaged eye mask. They then wore an eye mask that allowed light to pass through to reveal each eye for the duration of the following week.
On days six and seven of each week, participants underwent three cognitive tasks after sleeping with no light exposure (wearing the intact eye mask) and with minimal light exposure (wearing the eye mask with the holes):
- A paired-associate learning task was the first. This demonstrates the ease with which an individual can pick up new associations. Here, learning related word pairings was the task. In the days preceding the test, participants’ performance was higher when they slept with their eye masks intact than when they were exposed to light at night.
- Second, a psychomotor vigilance test was used by the researchers to gauge the subjects’ level of attentiveness. On this task, blocking light at night also resulted in faster reaction times.
- Lastly, a test of motor skill learning was administered, which entailed tapping a series of five numbers in the right order. Whether or not participants had worn an undamaged eye mask or been exposed to light during the night did not affect their performance on this test.
Sleep and Learning: What More Did the Scientists Discover About Eye Masks?
Since no research study is ever flawless, it’s crucial to consider the following conclusions with caution.
Data from sleep diaries showed that whether or not participants wore eye masks, there was no difference in their perceptions of the quality or quantity of sleep.
Additionally, using a monitoring tool known as the Dreem headband, the researchers objectively tracked sleep in a second experiment involving roughly thirty subjects. Wearing an eye mask did not alter individuals’ sleep patterns, such as the amount of time they spent in REM sleep.
Should I Get an Eye Mask Right Away Before a Big Exam or Meeting for Better Sleep Quality?
There’s a good chance that employing an eye mask won’t cost you more for overnight shipment. As a general rule, adhere to the chronobiologist’s advice of “bright days, dark nights.”
- Get as much natural light as you can during the day: stroll outside on your afternoon break at work, or go grab your morning bagel from the neighborhood bakery.
- Use the night-dimming features on your electronics, such as your cell phone, and limit the amount of time you spend using them in the evening. Make sure all lights that are not needed are turned off. Lastly, when you retire to bed, make an effort to keep your bedroom as dark as possible. This can entail turning off the light on a humidifier or moving the alarm clock next to your bed away from you.
Of course, you may decide that a comfortable, well-fitting eye mask is a good addition to your collection of light hygiene products. For the price of a few cups of coffee, you can find yourself sleeping better and performing better cognitively because most only cost $10 to $20.