For some students, getting the recommended amount of sleep per night is similar to getting a perfect score on the SAT—an unattainable, laughable goal.
According to the results of the Griffin sleep survey administered to students Feb. 22, seven to eight hours of sleep is a necessity neglected by well over half the students here, a statistic primarily attributed to homework and cellphone use.
Students are making enough difficult decisions—juggling rigorous courses, demanding athletics and taxing jobs—that it seems trivial to criticize them for excessive cellphone use. But when that cellphone use goes from a mindless diversion to something that eats away at vital sleep, it can take a turn for the worse.
A lack of sleep doesn’t result only in just drowsiness the next day. According to Pew Research Center, when students don’t get at least seven hours of sleep—which a whopping 69 percent of surveyed students said was true for them—they are prone to sickness, mood fluctuations and poor concentration.
Consider that 86.7 percent of students sleep with their phones by their bedsides. According to the National Sleep Foundation, blue light from electronic devices like cellphones inhibits the release of melatonin, the hormone responsible for sleepiness, tricking your body into thinking it’s still daytime. Because you feel more awake, you keep scrolling through Instagram until you feel sleepy—but joke’s on you! Your phone’s artificial light is making you artificially awake.
Here’s what you (and we) need to start doing: put your phone on the opposite side of the room for an hour before you go to sleep. And leave it there.
You and your quality of sleep with thank us later.