Watching Tiktok, scrolling through Instagram, finding a movie on Netflix, or even playing around on Roblox has become a part of most people’s nighttime routine. After showering, , brushing your teeth, putting on comfy pajamas, and crawling into your warm bed, your first instinct is to grab your phone and scroll mindlessly for an hour before actually sleeping. Yet, have you ever stopped to think about how that could be affecting your rest?
We have all fallen victim to endless scrolling because, frankly, it can be relaxing, right? Well…not exactly. Scrolling constantly can keep your mind awake. It leads your brain to think consistently and stay aware of your surroundings. Scrolling keeps us engaged, so even the slightest check can mess with your brain, interrupting your sleep pattern. It’s overall decreasing the amount of sleep you get. “Just five more minutes” rarely ever actually ends up being just five minutes. Every minute of scrolling is a minute less of sleep, which adds up to hours of sleep lost.
Not only can the activeness of scrolling mess with your sleep habits, but so can the blue light from your phone. Screens release a type of light called blue light, which overall mimics daylight–tricking your brain into thinking it’s day. Obviously, this is the least needed thing when crawling into bed. It messes with your sleep schedule, causing your brain to forget its clock, or timing, of when to fall asleep. The blue light slows down, or possibly even stops the melatonin production you have, therefore reducing the amount of quality sleep you’re getting. Most devices nowadays have light settings where you can turn off the blue light–yes, this helps, but there are more aspects to it, so when one part of the issue is “fixed,” it’s really only slightly helping the problem.
The buzzing notifications from texts, apps, and settings can mess with your deep sleep. Despite you not fully waking up, it’s causing lighter sleep habits–meaning you are not reaching the best rest possible. The sudden sound can activate awareness and disrupt the patterns of sleep. Reaching to check your phone, even for a second will wake up the brain. If you fall back into doomscrolling, you may find yourself watching emotional content such as sad videos. Stress is a primary cause of insomnia, and scrolling through social media guarantees the sight of something upsetting, or disturbing. Sleep and rest are supposed to be a calm part of your day, and watching something unpleasant right before sleep is leaving you with the possibility of insomnia.
75% of U.S citizens experience loss of sleep due to screens before bed. With young adults and teens being affected the most, 93% of students have admitted to staying up on their phones, and 36% checking their phones throughout the night. With phones increasing the loss of sleep percentages, 22% more teens have been studied to get under 7 hours of sleep since the release of phones. Furthermore, proving that using technology before sleeping decreases the quality and quantity of sleep, specifically in teens.
There are many better alternatives to do before closing up for the night, which may help reduce sleep struggles. Such as reading, listening to calm music, journaling,gratitude practices, etc. Try something new and see if your sleep improves over a period of time. Set a technology curfew and try to follow through with this, hopefully reducing the amount of lost sleep. For example, if you sleep at 9:30 pm, start with no screens after 8:50 pm, and slowly increase the amount of time in between sleep and screen time. We all fall to scrolling, but creating habits to help you avoid it will overall better your sleep health and keep you more awake throughout the day, leaving you healthier and happier.