It’s been too long in coming, and it’s still moving at a snail’s pace, but there is a low-amplitude groundswell of recognition that sleep is a critical factor in our physical and mental health. Sleep deprivation has been implicated in problems as far-reaching as attention deficit–like symptoms and obesity. Students who don’t get enough sleep are more likely to be depressed and to do poorly on exams.
If there were an award for the least sleep friendly environment, American colleges and universities would win, hands down. Many parents also deserve special recognition for allowing children to have televisions in their bedrooms and failing to set even a vague approximation of a healthy bedtime. But the ivory towers of education remain the places least likely to offer a good night’s sleep.
One of the reasons for this unfortunate situation is the predictable response of young people who suddenly find themselves without parental oversight. Combined with that phenomenon is what some sleep scientists believe is a normal physiological adjustment in sleep cycles during adolescence. I agree that a shift does occur with puberty, but I wonder how much of the late-to-bed, late-to-rise habit is inflated by enabling societal responses.
An attitude that sleep deprivation is a necessary part of college life blankets every campus. Students often brag about how little they have slept or how many all-nighters they have endured. The schools have done their share of enabling, as sleep-promoting rules that once were part of dormitory life have been allowed to evaporate. A student must now ask for a "quiet dorm" assignment to get even a poor approximation of a good night’s sleep. One college has even scheduled its freshman orientation activities to begin after 10 or 11 a.m. to match the entering students’ sleep habits.
It has always seemed strange to me that what for many young people is the last stop on their way to the "real world" fosters a sleep schedule incompatible with most "real world" jobs. But there are some feeble winds of change rustling the ivy on the walls of several American colleges.
An Associated Press story by Justin Pope, "Colleges Open Their Eyes: ZZZs Are Key to GPA" (Portland Press Herald, Aug. 31, 2012) includes several examples of colleges that have taken an interest in their students’ sleep habits. At Hastings (Neb.) College, campus health officials installed a bed in the student union, donned pajamas, and engaged students in discussions about sleep. The officials were motivated by their observations that sleep deprivation and mental health problems are often related. Macalaster College in St. Paul, Minn., publishes a "nap map" describing various campus locations where students might take a restorative snooze. The University of Louisville (Ky.) has planned a campus-wide "flash nap" to highlight the importance of sleep.
But these somewhat gimmicky efforts are the exception. The National College Health Assessment includes the troubling observation that although three-fourths of the students report having a sleep problem, the same percentage can’t recall receiving any information about sleep, according to Mr. Pope’s report.
The only example in which an institution has made substantive changes to address sleep deprivation comes from a prep school. Deerfield (Mass.) Academy advanced its morning class start time from 7:55 a.m. to 8:30 a.m., and decreased its sports practices and homework expectations by 10%. These changes were followed by a 20% decrease in infirmary visits, a significant increase in grade point average, and an improvement in the athletic teams’ end-of-the-year records, according to the article.
Of course, prep school students are more malleable than are near-adult college students. But the point is that if a school commits itself to sleep-promoting structural and procedural changes, the quality of the students’ lives and learning experiences will improve. Colleges have a long way to go to move beyond promotional stunts and a handful of quiet dorms.
It will be interesting to see whether colleges and universities begin to take meaningful steps to protect and promote healthy sleep habits now that the medical community has finally awakened to the health hazards of sleep deprivation.
Dr. Wilkoff practices general pediatrics in a multispecialty group practice in Brunswick, Maine. E-mail him at pdnews@elsevier.com.