External Factors that Influence Sleep

Last reviewed on: 13th November, 2020

External factors, such as anything we eat and drink, the medicines we take, and the surroundings in which we sleep can also significantly affect the extent and excellence of our sleep. In overall, all of these factors tend to rise the number of attentions and limit the deepness of sleep. The following some of these factors;

1. Light’s Effect

Light coverage can cause our biological watch to progress or pause, which disturbs our sleep and awaken cycle. Light is one of the most significant exterior factors that can disturb sleep. It does so both precisely, by creating it hard for people to fall asleep, and obliquely, by inducing the timing of our interior clock and thereby disturbing our favorite time to sleep.

Light stimulate our interior clock over specific light sensor cells in the retina of our eyes. These cells, which inhabit the same space as the rods and cones that create vision viable, inform the brain whether it is a day or night, and our sleep forms are set consequently.

The innovation of the electric light bulb in the late 19th century, we are now revealed to more light at nighttime than we had been revealed all over our evolution. This moderately new pattern of light coverage is nearly convinced to have disturbed our patterns of sleep. Contact to light in the late evening tends to pause the phase of our interior clock and control us to favor later sleep times. Contact to light in the middle of the night can have more capricious effects, but can surely be enough to cause our interior clock to be reset, and may make it hard to return to sleep.

2. Jet Interval and Shift Work

Generally, light aids to set our interior clock to the suitable time. Though, difficulties can occur when our disclosure to light changes due to a shift in work timetable or take a trip across time zones. Under ordinary conditions, our interior clock intensely influences our capability to sleep at numerous times over the course of a 24-hour period, as well as which sleep stages we knowledge encounter while we do sleep.

About 50% of night shift workers frequently report snoozing off and falling asleep when they are at work. This should be seen as an crucial anxiety both for individuals and society, provided that airline pilots, air traffic controllers, physicians, nurses, police, and other public safety workers are all employed in careers in which peak working during a night shift may be serious.

3. Discomfort, Anxiety, and Other Medical Situations

An extensive range of medical and psychological conditions can have an influence on the organization and distribution of sleep. These conditions include prolonged pain from inflammation and other medical conditions, pain caused by gastro esophageal reflux disease, pre-menstrual disease, and many others. Like many other sleep disturbances, pain and discomfort tend to restrict the depth of sleep and allow only brief episodes of sleep between wakening.

Persons of all ages who undergo stress, anxiety, and depression tend to find it more problematic to fall asleep, and when they do, sleep tends to be light and includes more Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and less deep sleep. This is likely because our bodies are programmed to react to stressful and potentially dangerous conditions by waking up. Stress, even that caused by daily concerns, can promote this arousal response and make restful sleep more hard to achieve.

4. Medications and Other Substances

Numerous common chemicals affect both amount and quality of sleep. These incorporate alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, and antihistamines, as well as endorsement medicines including beta blockers, alpha blockers, and antidepressants.

Posted by: Lusubilo A. Mwaijengo