Starting Work Before This Time Of Day Is Basically Torture, Says Research
This confirms ALL of our suspicions.
CrizzyStudio / Shutterstock Dr. Paul Kelley, a researcher at Oxford University, has scientifically corroborated the claim that nearly every worker to ever live has made: that it stinks to work before 10 a.m. You may find yourself more tired or have a harder time focusing, and that's because our sleep cycles aren't biologically designed to function at the highest level until later in the morning.
When I saw this study, I knew I had to write an article about it, though I decided immediately that it would definitely have to be written after 10 a.m.
Research finds that starting work before 10 a.m. is basically torture.
As Kelley shared in a speech at the British Science Festival, "We’ve got a sleep-deprived society. It is hugely damaging on the body’s systems because you are affecting physical, emotional, and performance systems in the body."
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Those younger than 55 don't have circadian rhythms aligned with the typical 9-5 work schedule, putting them at an increased risk for sleep deprivation, obesity, and certain mental health problems. The Sleep Foundation supports these claims, saying, "As people age, the body’s circadian rhythms actually shift forward in time. This shift is called a phase advance. Many older adults experience this phase advance as getting tired earlier in the afternoon and waking up earlier in the morning."
With that information, Kelley has determined that there needs to be a global shift in the way we work — not only starting our work days later, but starting our children's school days later as well.
Starting the school day later could help optimize student performance.
One of Kelley's own studies has shown that the average 10-year-old struggles to focus on school work if it happens before about 8:30 a.m., and that the best educational results happen at around 11 a.m.
Dr. Kelley says that if the educational experience children receive were to happen in the afternoon instead of the morning, it would result in a 10% increase in overall grades across the board. But of course, starting mid-morning doesn't just help kids.
He affirms that a later start to the day "is something that would benefit all people, particularly families; parents who go and try to wake up teenagers who are waking up three hours too early. It creates tensions for everybody." Unfortunately, a later start to he school day doesn't correlate with normal working hours, which would put a serious hurt on families with working parents.
The primary reason Americans sacrifice sleep is to work.
A study published in the journal Sleep discovered that, across nearly all sociodemographic categories, work is the top activity that people give up sleep for. Participants who claimed they slept 6 hours or less at night also reported working 1.55 more hours on weekdays and 1.86 more hours on weekends.
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The results also showed that, for every hour that work or school started later in the morning, participants got an extra 20 minutes of sleep. It may not seem like a lot of time, but it makes a big difference in how you feel and perform in the morning.
Lead study author Dr. Mathias Basner, assistant professor of sleep and chronobiology in psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia, said, "Potential intervention strategies to decrease the prevalence of chronic sleep loss in the population include greater flexibility in morning work and class start times, reducing the prevalence of multiple jobs, and shortening morning and evening commute times."
Now, if only we could get corporate higher-ups to get on board, and heck, throw in a 4-day workweek as well, imagine how much happier and more productive everyone would be.
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