Daily Science | How to sleep scientifically?

Knowledge is power2023-05-09

Author: Rui Ming

People usually think that sleeping 8 hours a day is a healthy sleep. In fact, the length of sleep is not fixed, but varies from person to person. There are large individual differences due to factors such as genetics, age, type of work, and season. There is no need to adhere to the dogma of ensuring 8 hours of sleep a day.

The quality of sleep depends on the degree of wakefulness during the day. Natural sleep without feeling sleepy during the day is the best. However, the average sleep time of teenagers is longer than that of middle-aged and elderly people. Teenagers should ensure adequate sleep time. How to help teenagers sleep well is a topic of common concern for society and families.

Improving sleep habits starts with exercise

To develop good sleeping habits, you should start with physical activities. Teenagers should do at least one hour of physical exercise during the day, such as running, gymnastics, football, badminton, swimming, martial arts, mountain climbing, rowing, dancing, etc., so that they can sleep better at night.

One of the biological bases of the wake-sleep cycle is homeostasis. After consuming energy and energy, the human body needs compensatory physical replenishment and rest. A certain intensity of activity during the day can induce deep sleep at night.

Choosing the time for physical activities is also very important. In addition to morning exercises after getting up, choosing the time period during the day when you are most likely to feel sleepy to do physical exercises can effectively increase the amount of activity during the day and at the same time extend the time of deep sleep at night, which can be said to kill two birds with one stone.

Melatonin is a brain hormone that is secreted at night to promote sleep. Exposure to sunlight during the day can promote the brain's secretion of melatonin at night, so daytime physical activities should be carried out outdoors as much as possible.

Reasonable and clever arrangement of holiday activities is also an important part of the whole sleep management. The habit of going to bed late and getting up late on holidays is quite common among teenagers. This will induce late sleep over time and lead to circadian rhythm disorder. Therefore, arranging some collective entertainment activities from the weekend morning can prevent the occurrence of such disorders.

Optimize the sleeping environment for a comfortable sleep

Parents should pay attention to their children's bedroom and sleeping environment. Physical and chemical factors such as bedroom temperature, humidity, light, noise, odor, color, air pressure, etc. may affect children's sleep. Bedrooms facing the street can use double-glazed windows to reduce external noise.

Half an hour before bedtime, the indoor light intensity should be reduced to below 40 lux (the indoor headlight brightness is generally 150-180 lux, and the table lamp brightness is generally 40-60 lux). Do not sleep with the lights on or the TV on. Different lighting equipment should be used to adjust the light intensity for children's study, life and sleep scenes.

The bedroom should maintain a constant temperature and humidity, about 20 degrees Celsius in winter and about 25 degrees Celsius in summer; the humidity should be 50%. The bedroom should maintain good ventilation at night.

Master bedtime skills to fall asleep quickly and peacefully

Preparations for bedtime should be done half an hour before bedtime. Avoid excitement and stimulation, and learn to relax yourself. Stop strenuous activities and watch electronic products that emit blue light (tablets, mobile phones, etc.) 2 hours before bedtime. Do not drink stimulating beverages such as coffee or tea 4 hours before bedtime. Parents who smoke should pay attention to prevent their children from passive smoking. When children are overly excited or cannot calm down, they do not need to be restricted by the scheduled bed rest, and can wait until they feel really sleepy before lying down.

Body temperature can be divided into deep body temperature and surface body temperature. Medical research has shown that when a person enters a sleeping state, the greater the temperature difference between the deep body temperature and the surface body temperature, the easier it is to enter a deep sleep. Taking a warm bath or soaking your feet before going to bed can increase the temperature difference between the deep body temperature and the surface body temperature. The water temperature for showering or bathing should be controlled to be slightly above the limit of body temperature. Too high water temperature will increase the degree of wakefulness, make it difficult to fall asleep, and induce dry skin.

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Bedding selection for good sleep

Sleeping equipment is closely related to sleep quality. You should choose the right pillow, quilt, mattress, mat, and mat based on your own physical characteristics.

The normal sleeping position of the human body is lying on the side, and the trunk and head will naturally turn over dozens of times during sleep. Although some commercially available pillows take into account the curvature of the head and neck, they are only suitable for lying on the back, so you can consider using a pillow that corresponds to all sleeping positions. Sleeping naked can reduce the pulling of pajamas on various parts of the body. When choosing bedding, you need to pay attention to whether it has a constant temperature and humidity function.

Developing good sleeping habits is like a "start button" that can drive changes in overall life patterns. A good sleep can ensure lifelong health.

(Author's unit: Director of the Healthy Sleep Research Institute)

Editor-in-charge: Hu Huiwen