Your Computer Or iPad Could Be Disrupting Sleep 351
Crash McBang sends in a CNN report on electronics and sleeplessness and asks, "So, what do Slashdotters do to get a good night's rest?" "More than ever, consumer electronics — particularly laptops, smartphones, and Apple's new iPad — are shining bright light into our eyes until just moments before we doze off. Now there's growing concern that these glowing gadgets may actually fool our brains into thinking it's daytime. Exposure can disturb sleep patterns and exacerbate insomnia, some sleep researchers said in interviews. ... Unlike paper books or e-book readers like the Amazon Kindle, which does not emit its own light, the iPad's screen shines light directly into the reader's eyes from a relatively close distance. That makes the iPad and laptops more likely to disrupt sleep patterns than, say, a television sitting across the bedroom or a lamp that illuminates a paper book, both of which shoot far less light straight into the eye, researchers said."
Of all the bizare complaints about modern eletroni (Score:3, Insightful)
Of all the bizarre complaints about modern electronics, this is the first one I can definitively understand. Though, how is this any different from the other light sources in reflecting into our eyes at night. I have lights in every room of my house, my TV, and the street lamp outside- so this is nothing new.
How about researcher before we panic? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that this line from the article says it all:
While there has been research to show that light -- even artificial light -- can affect human melatonin production, no research has been done specifically on whether the iPad and laptops disrupt sleep cycles.
Basically, we'll speculate wildly about what might be harming you (threats sell news!) without any actual research. I'm not saying that the claims are improbable, just that it can't be that hard to do some studies on the effects of iPads and other gadgets on sleep. This isn't even a multi-year study, it ought to take a few months (max) to run and probably a few more to work over the data.
Re:Um (Score:1, Insightful)
you must have not rtfs
it mentions the ipad
_THE_ _IPAD_
go back and read it if you don't believe me
When will the media learn.. (Score:5, Insightful)
when will people get this :
NO ONE CARES WHAT "A RESEARCHER" (or professor, or cleverdick) SAYS
we only care if they have published peer reviewed research that we can read and evaluate for ourselves and then decide if we believe if it is substantively true or not.
Thank you for your attention.
Re:I believe this (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't doubt you, but do you really think it's because the light from the screen fools your brain into thinking it's still daytime, or do you think it's something completely different?
Personally, I think a lot of people just need to "wind down" before they can get to sleep. They can't go from doing something mentally stimulating to sleeping, just like that. People can fall asleep watching TV because it's a passive activity... but using your computer requires some interaction and mental processing.
Re:Well, doh! (Score:3, Insightful)
Except it isn't that they are on while you are sleeping, it's that you use them as you are about to sleep.
Instead of reading a book before you turn off the reading lamp and go to sleep, you're holding an iPad a few inches from your eyes before turning it off and going to sleep.
Freakin' Mac "Like Paper" look to blame (Score:5, Insightful)
The greatest thing about my new "Linux Mint" distribution with "CompizConfig" was the "negative" trick under "Accessibility". It negates all the colour bits in a window or desktop, turning the usual "black ink on white paper" look of most web pages (at least news pages) to white-on-black.
Hitting that button at night makes you go "aaahhh" as your eyes stop aching when you hadn't noticed how strained they were.
It was all keewwwwl for them to make the Mac be the first computer to have word processing and so forth look like black ink on paper when every computer monitor before them had been white text on dark. But direct light into your face is NOT reflections from paper and it was always a stupid idea for legibility and ergonomics both.
I'm not sure about the sleep thing (I don't recall any trouble before I got the "negative" function a few months ago) but trust me, get that capability if you use either a CRT or LCD with modern apps and web pages in a dim room. Your optic nerves will practically sob with relief.
blah blah iPad (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:f.lux (Score:3, Insightful)
Weekend naps are extra sweet. The wife and kid are out shopping or doing whatever teenaged kids do. It's only you and the dog and you stretch out on the couch and the dog's already snoring on the floor next to you and the White Sox are playing a day game in May when the games don't mean anything and you make it through the second inning and the next thing you know, you're dreaming of flying.
Sweet.
Re:Simple fix (Score:3, Insightful)
And if you get married, you get to have sex all the time!
Spoken like an unmarried man!
Re:f.lux (Score:3, Insightful)
Isn't this a solution to a completely different problem? The issue here is not with ambient light while you're trying to sleep, but rather the bright lights shone into your eyes by various appliances while you're using them messing with your body clock.
f.lux attempts to deal with this by altering the colour temperature of your monitors. Another way might be to simply turn your monitor's brightness down.