It is crucial for the average human to sleep 9 hours per night. That means in 1 year 3,285 hours will be spent asleep. By the age of ninety, 12,240 days have been spent in bed, and 293,220 hours. This means at ninety years old, 34 years have been spent asleep (National Sleep Foundation, September 2015). Sleep is essential for humans, by knowing the purpose of sleep, how the brain and body are involved, improving sleep, and how dreaming functions will help further understand how to engage in a restful sleep. Not everyone has a sleep cycle, which can lead to harming the body. Sleeping cycles are a benefit for health in many ways such as school, work, injuries, and other health concerns. It can be very hard to have a regular sleep cycle when there are many other important needs. Lack of sleep can lead to health risks such as, diabetes, obesity, heart disease, sleep disorders, immune and circulatory complications, and hormones (Epstein, 2007). Many teens have the tendency of staying up to late to do homework and then waking up early to go to school. This is the reason why many teens don’t have a sleep cycle, and acceptable health. About 60% of people under the age of 18 complain of being tired during the day, and around 15% of them fall asleep during the day. As a result to this many schools have made the start time later, teens are able to have extra sleep, and a be successful in school (National Sleep Foundation, 9/21/15). A growing teenager needs a total of 8-9 hours of
Students,especially students who drive to and from school are also at risk of more car crashes because of sleep deprivation. Additionally getting good sleep is important to maintaining good health,staying awake and alert, and working at peak performance. Although students can simply sleep earlier, many need that time to study and complete homework, with a later start time students can get their homework down and get a sufficient amount of sleep.”According to this research, the ideal amount of sleep for the average teenager falls between 8.5 and 9.5 hours a night, and teenagers who receive adequate sleep benefit from better physical and mental health, safety, and academic performance. It also revealed that puberty causes a “phase delay” in teenagers, which shifts the time that teenagers fall asleep back by two
It is a well known fact that teenagers in general need more sleep. According to the National Sleep Foundation: “[teenage sleep] is as important as the air you breathe, the water you drink and the food you eat. It can even help you to eat better and manage stress of being a teen.” When schools start as early as 7 o’clock, it puts students health at risk. Adolescents already have a natural shift in their internal body clock, or circadian rhythm when it comes to sleep. Puberty allows this to happen, causing a “sleep phase delay” of about two hours. When teens can't fall asleep until late and school starts so early, they aren't getting nearly enough sleep. Lack of such, according to CDC, makes the individual
Adolescents today face a widespread chronic health problem: sleep deprivation. Research shows that getting enough sleep is a biological necessity. Sleep is essential for a person’s health and wellbeing, according to the National Sleep Foundation (NSF). Teens are among those least likely to get enough sleep; while they need on average 9 1/4 hours of sleep per night for optimal performance and health and brain development, teens average fewer than 7 hours per school night, and most report feeling tired during the day (Nationwide Childrens, 2003). The root of the problem is early school start times.
Some people may ask, “Why don’t teenagers just go to bed earlier, instead of having school later?” This is a common concern for parents and teachers as well. The fact is, adolescents have different sleeping patterns than adults do. Throughout the day, teenagers are most tired during the morning, and most alert at night (Cerve 4). “The body’s internal clock shifts after puberty, making it
“Why do we sleep?” is a very popular questions that many humans ask today. Sleep is very sufficient to the human body. If it was not important, then God would not have designed for a third of our life to be occupied by sleep. During this time period, many people are interested to know what is a good amount of sleep and what are the harmful effects to not getting enough sleep.
As a result of a changing body and mind, adolescent sleep cycles have different needs than those of adults or younger children. As a matter of fact, Biologically, sleep patterns shift toward later times for both sleeping and waking during adolescence -- meaning it is natural to not be able to fall asleep before 11:00 pm (“Teens”). In addition to biological change in sleep patterns, teenagers also tend to have eccentric sleep cycles. Obtaining less than healthy hours of sleep during the school week and then catching up on their sleep on the weekends. Most teenagers during the school week, do not get the suggested amount of sleep. In fact, according to a recent poll conducted by the National Sleep Foundation, 80% of teenagers do not get the suggested amount of sleep of 9 hours on school nights (“School Start”). With changing bodies and minds, along with an increased amount of schoolwork and extracurricular activities, teenagers need more sleep than children of a younger age. Experts believe that moving back the start time of school for high school students will improve grades, test scores, and the overall health and personality of many students.
School start times play a very big role in a student’s overall development, especially when they aren’t getting enough sleep because of it. An important factor to consider for a student’s development is the act of sleeping; that a lack of it can cause serious problems to the students’ growing body. According to research done with Brown University’s Julie Boergers, the author of the letter “Benefits of later school start times”, the amount of sleep that adolescents need ranges from 8.5 to 9.5 hours of sleep. Only 17 percent of these students
Lack of sleep can lead teenagers to gain weight, become depressed or engage in risky activities (i.e. drugs, alcohol) and can lead to poor school performance overall (CDC). These consequences are not the only problem with teenagers losing sleep because of school work. During teenage years, an individual’s biological clock causes them to want to go to sleep later in the morning due to various hormones in their bodies. Students aren’t naturally supposed to wake up early, yet in 42 states the majority of school’s start before 8:30 A.M (CDC), but
Their health is affected because students may not be getting enough sleep. Lack of sleep also known as sleep deprivation can include: “weight gain and eating disorders and increased risk of obesity, cardiovascular problems, and diabetes; reduced immunity; depression; anxiety; substance abuse; mood swings; behavior problems; suicidal ideation; and potential impacts on brain development” (Why). The recommended amount of sleep for growing teens in middle and high school is eight to ten hours a night (MacMillan). The recommended amount of sleep for teenagers is difficult for many teens to achieve because of how early school starts and how late they get home from school related activities the night before. For example, if a student was in basketball they could have practice from after school to five or later, or they could have a game an hour away. After their practice or game they could have a lot of homework and need to study for a test they have the next day. Students then go to sleep late, still having to get up early the next morning and go to school to take that test. The amount of sleep also has to do with the way the teen brain works. Emily Richmond says, “Adolescents’ ‘internal clocks’—the circadian rhythms that control a human’s responses to stimuli and determine sleep patterns—operate differently than those of other age groups. It’s typically more difficult for adolescents to fall asleep earlier in the
School districts expect us to wake up half an hour after the crack of dawn, go to school and while groggy and sleep deprived, and still expect us to surrender our full attention in each and every one of our 6 periods. Sending sleep-deprived teenagers to school as early as 5:30 is dangerously unhealthy, unsafe, and evidently counterproductive. According to the American Academy ofPediatrics, without receiving the appropriate amount of sleep teenagers find it 60% harder to focus in class. Lack of sleep can lead to excessive fatigue, emotional distress, laziness, obesity and a lowered perception of quality of
Serious health issues like depression could be caused if a teen doesn’t get enough sleep, but with homework to do, essays to write, and exams to study for, it is hard to get a good night’s rest. A later starting time for school could significantly help. O’Neill says, “Studies show that tired teens have an increased risk of depression, anxiety, obesity, and illness,” (O’Neill 20). From this quote, it is evident that many health conditions could arise from not getting enough sleep. However, not only mental problems can develop.
Most teenagers think that it is cool staying up late with friends, but the lack of sleep is slowly killing you with the toxins of society. A recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention related lack of sleep to health risks such as being overweight,
Most teens need about 8 to 10 hours of sleep each night. Anyone who wants to succeed at what they are do must have the right amount of sleep. Unfortunately, many teens do not get enough sleep. Therefore, school should start later for teenagers. Heath professionals and sleep researchers have stated that starting school early is harming children in many ways. Lack of sleep can cause major heart diseases, diabetes and much more. Many studies show that sleeping less than 5 hours a night increases the risk of death from all causes by about 15 percent. When implemented, the solution would benefit the students and teachers. Both the students and teachers would be energized, and ready for their day. Continuing on, the time schedule
According to Ruthann Richter, director media relations for medical school’s Office of Communication & Public Affairs "more than 87 percent of high school students in the United States get far less than the recommended weight to 10 hours, and the amount of time they sleep is decreasing - serious threat to their health, safety, and academic success." (1). Sleep quality is very important to teenagers or adolescent, not many of them are getting enough sleep that they should have. They need to have enough sleep, so their body can work efficiently to grow healthy. Schools in America have to adjust their opening time to match with sleep time children should have. Teens cannot adjust their sleep time because of the energy drinks consumed in their body the night before. This situation would quickly exhaust teens rather than give them the cognitive performance they wanted. "As we look at caffeine use for adolescents, one of the things that we're seeing is that it can actually become a gateway drug-- that you have your caffeine, you have it in the morning, but again, you have it in the afternoon, maybe in the evening, and then you can't sleep.”, Dr. Mary Sheedy Kurcinka acknowledged (1). Not having enough sleep could heavily affect teens emotion and behaviors. They could be angry easily, grumpy, sleepy, or having violent behaviors. At this age, they are processing information, and make judgments for
Our bodies are like batteries. If we don’t get sleep they can’t be charged and we’ll feel the effects. A toy with dead batteries isn’t nearly as fun as when fresh ones are used. Getting sleep everyday is important. The longest someone has gone straight without sleep has been 11 days by Randy Gardner in 1964 who was a sleep test patient. During this