Let's Just Be Grateful That People Don't Snore As They're Daydreaming

You could stuff a quilt with the many studies that show Americans getting too few hours of sleep. However, that's only half of the sad bedtime story. A new survey by the National Sleep Foundation makes it clear there are also problems with the quality of sleep many Americans get. The quantity of sleep remains insufficient. On weeknights, adults get an average of 6.8 hours of sleep; on weekends, they average 7.4 hours. That's less than many respondents feel they need, and significantly less than experts recommend. Twenty percent of men and 26 percent of women said they get less than the minimum hours of sleep they need to function at their best during the day. Those numbers understate the full problem, though. Half the respondents said they get "a good night's sleep" just a few nights a week (24 percent), a few nights a month (13 percent), rarely (10 percent) or never (3 percent). Some try to compensate for their shortage of sound nighttime sleep by taking naps: 55 percent of adults said they take at least one nap per week, and 35 percent said they take at least two.Apart from insufficient hours in bed, what prevents so many people from getting a good night's sleep? For some, it takes a while to nod off. Once a person has gone to bed, it takes an average of 23 minutes before sleep ensues. For 22 percent of adults, though, it takes more than half an hour. Moreover, that may be just the beginning of their nocturnal woes. Thirty-two percent of respondents said they wake up a lot during the night on at least a few nights a week; 22 percent awake too early and have trouble falling back to sleep. For these and other reasons, 38 percent said they wake up feeling unrefreshed at least a few times a week. And then there's snoring, the sleep problem that people share with the rest of the household. Twenty-four percent of the survey's respondents said they snore every night or almost every night, with another 17 percent saying they do so at least a couple nights per week. Among all those who snore at times, 64 percent said "their snoring is as loud as talking, or slightly louder than breathing"; 17 percent reported that their snoring "is very loud and can be heard in adjacent rooms." This takes its toll, of course, on anyone within earshot. Among respondents who are married or otherwise living with someone, 26 percent said they lose some sleep—49 minutes a night, on average—due to their partner's snoring and other sleep problems. Nearly one-third have been driven to "sleep in a separate bed, bedroom, or on the couch," alter their sleep schedule or don earplugs or eye masks.

Brand Marketing

Let's Just Be Grateful That People Don't Snore As They're Daydreaming

Mark Dolliver

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications

WORK SMARTER - LEARN, GROW AND BE INSPIRED.

Subscribe today!

Mark Dolliver