Why bedtime television is bad for children and you

Most of us watch TV in the evening. It’s now a tradition that more than half of us enjoy every day. In America, an average person watches TV five hours a day. That time has grown over the past few decades and has now begun to affect our sleep.

Even without a TV in the bedroom itself, which many have, studies show that people watch TV later in the evening, sometimes until after midnight. This is particularly problematic when we look at the quality of sleep, as it deteriorates.

It is estimated that more than half of the American population will watch bed until just before bed. The reason that the quality of sleep deteriorates is because of the light that the screen emits.

The light from screens, including cell phones, is an artificial blue light. Our body combines this type of light with daylight. For our body and mind, the light received from screens shows that it is still day.

Our bodies normally release a hormone called melatonin in the darker hours of the evening. This hormone prompts the body and prepares it for sleep. However, if the body is under the false impression of daylight, it will not produce this hormone and we will have difficulty falling asleep.

Melatonin is an important hormone that is crucial for the regularity and sleep quality of our body clock. Due to the confusion of the body, we are often faced with jet lag because our internal clocks are not sure when to produce melatonin.

While our bodies can withstand the occasional night of watching TV before bed, the sustained and daily pressures this puts on the body can lead to long-term worsening of sleep. And television before bed is now a daily routine for almost half of all Americans.

Our Watch TV and sleep Habits cause poor sleep quality and affect our children as well. While we tend to take the stress out of our children by watching TV, it is particularly detrimental to a child’s health as their body needs regular sleep for their development.

While many suggestions for improving our wellbeing include diet and exercise, sleep should be treated with the same consideration. Our night’s rest is fundamental to our body and mind. Better sleep not only improves our mood, but is also important for our physical recovery.

For example, the heart is less stressed during sleep than when we are awake. This resting phase for the heart helps immensely and is supposed to prolong the health of our heart later in life. Put simply, more sleep is better for our bodies. Watching TV, as entertaining as it is, robs us of quality sleep and also causes us to sleep less, which means it’s much worse for our health in the long run.