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Sleeping Patterns: A Meta-Analytic Analysis

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Sleeping is something that many individuals tend to underestimate in regards to its importance. A regular sleeping schedule can have many benefits on an individual's mental and physical health and can have an overall benefit on their quality of life. Unfortunately, not many people get the proper amount and quality of sleep. In fact, it is estimated that around fifty to seventy million US adults suffer from some kind of sleeping problem and/or disorder (CDC, 2015). This is an issue because insufficient sleeping patterns can lead to a number of different problems such as; chronic diseases, slow reactions, inability to think clearly, inability to learn, and an overall higher risk of dangerous outcomes (NIH, 2012). Given its high prevalence in …show more content…

In a study done by Kredlow et al. (2015), they sought to examine the effects of acute and chronic exercise on sleeping patterns. They hypothesized that acute and regular exercise patterns would have objective and subjective sleep variables. In order to test this, Kredlow et al. completed a meta-analytic review of sixty three articles retrieved from PubMed and PsychInfo. Within the articles chosen, they extracted participant characteristics, exercise characteristics, and sleep characteristics. Overall the data showed that in terms of acute exercise; which consists of less strenuous exercises completed over a short period of time; total sleep time, sleep efficiency or the ratio of time spent asleep to the amount of item spent awake, and duration of slow wave sleep were greater. They also found that sleep onset was lesser in those who complete acute exercise activities versus control days of no exercise. In regards to regular exercise; which is more strenuous exercise over longer periods of time; total sleep time, sleep efficacy, and sleep quality increased in those who completed regular exercise activities versus those control days of no exercise. Generally they found that exercise has beneficial effect on sleep with regular exercise and the effects were more moderate for acute exercises. This meta-analytic review shows support for the claim that exercise quality and duration has beneficial effects on sleeping patterns, however the type of exercise could differ in the amount of benefit it

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