Georgia Injury Law Blog
Many teenagers have poor sleep hygiene, and this can increase their risks of being involved in drowsy driving-related car accidents. A new study shows that poor sleep quality in teenagers can occur because of their addiction to texting and video games.
It is no secret that teenagers are addicted to their smartphones, but it is specific types of smartphone usage that may be especially detrimental to teenagers and their sleep patterns. Researchers at Penn State analyzed smartphone behavior by teenagers and its impact on their sleep patterns. They found all smartphone usage was not the same as far as impact on sleep hygiene goes. The study found that interactive activities like texting or playing video games have the most detrimental effect on a teenager’s sleep quality.
Interestingly enough, these activities do not even have to take place close to the teenager’s sleep time for it to affect his sleep duration or time. Even daytime activities like playing video games can impact sleep quality and duration. For every one hour more than usual that a teen played a video game, his usual bedtime was delayed by 10 minutes.