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August 7, 2015 / 64(30);809-813
, PhD1; , PhD1; , PhD1
Adolescents who do not get enough sleep are more likely to be overweight (1); not engage in daily physical activity (2); suffer from depressive symptoms (2); engage in unhealthy risk behaviors such as drinking, smoking tobacco, and using illicit drugs (2); and perform poorly in school (3).
However, insufficient sleep is common among high school students, with
less than one third of U.S. high school students sleeping at least 8
hours on school nights (4). In a policy statement published in
2014, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) urged middle and high
schools to modify start times as a means to enable students to get
adequate sleep and improve their health, safety, academic performance,
and quality of life (5). AAP recommended that "middle and high schools should aim for a starting time of no earlier than 8:30 a.m." (5).
To assess state-specific distributions of public middle and high school
start times and establish a pre-recommendation baseline, CDC and the
U.S. Department of Education analyzed data from the 2011–12 Schools and
Staffing Survey (SASS). Among an estimated 39,700 public middle, high,
and combined schools* in the United States, the average start time was
8:03 a.m. Overall, only 17.7% of these public schools started school at
8:30 a.m. or later. The percentage of schools with 8:30 a.m. or later
start times varied greatly by state, ranging from 0% in Hawaii,
Mississippi, and Wyoming to more than three quarters of schools in
Alaska (76.8%) and North Dakota (78.5%). A school system start time
policy of 8:30 a.m. or later provides teenage students the opportunity
to achieve the 8.5–9.5 hours of sleep recommended by AAP (5) and the 8–10 hours recommended by the National Sleep Foundation (6)...http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6430a1.htm?s_cid=mm6430a1_e
We need urgent austerity for the sake of posterity.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like sleep scientists stay up all night trying to figure out why adolescents do not get enough sleep.
ReplyDeleteThis research has been going on since at least 1999, but no action has been taken. http://web.stanford.edu/~dement/adolescent.html
I have taken numerous courses from UCLA based lecturers on the subject in terms of adolescents and seniors as well. This is truly a long studied topic and the results like the above should be noted as sleep is in many respects in the long term as important as eating. Also the type of sleep is critical as well. One would have to research and read a lot of legitimate sites to obtain an understanding of all the information pointing to the need for action in all aspects of life as well as education. It is a well documented subject in psychology and medicine.
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