Global warming: How does night-time heat reduce our sleep time?

Global warming is said to have a negative impact on the sleeping habits of people around the world. This is the conclusion of a study by four researchers published on Friday, May 20 2022 in the journal One Earth.

Hot nights reduce sleep by 14 minutes

In order to carry out their study, the scientists collected data on more than 47,000 adults in 68 countries using sleep monitoring bracelets. After observing the results, they made some alarming conclusions. The Hill reported:

On very warm nights — those with temperatures above 30 degrees Celsius, or 86 degrees Fahrenheit — sleep amounts dropped an average of more than 14 minutes, the researchers observed.

According to them, the higher the temperatures become, the more the quality of sleep decreases, with a significant loss in the length of the night. The researchers finally came to the conclusion that by 2100, global warming could ‘result in the loss of between 50 and 58 hours of sleep per person per year’, before the Earth becomes uninhabitable.

The impact of global warming varies between individuals

Kelton Minor, one of the researchers involved in the study published in One Earth, gave further details about the impact of global warming on sleep. He explained that global warming does not affect people equally. Women and the elderly would be more affected than men, for example.

Another finding concerns developing countries, which would also be more affected by rising temperatures at night. This could be explained by the contribution of air conditioning around the world. This information should be taken lightly, however, as it could not be confirmed in the study conducted by the researchers.

This article was translated from Gentside FR.

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