COPENHAGEN (Dispatches) -- Increasing ambient temperatures negatively impact human sleep around the globe, according to a new research.
Scientists from the University of Copenhagen found that by the year 2099, suboptimal temperatures may erode 50 to 58 hours of sleep per person per year. Also, they discovered that the temperature effect on sleep loss is substantially larger for residents from lower income countries as well as in older adults and females.
Researchers used anonymized global sleep data collected from accelerometer-based sleep-tracking wristbands. The data included 7 million nightly sleep records from more than 47,000 adults across 68 countries spanning all continents except for Antarctica. Measures from the type of wristbands used in this study had previously been shown to align with independent measures of wakefulness and sleep.
The team realized that on very warm nights (greater than 30 degrees Celsius, or 86 degrees Fahrenheit), sleep declines an average of just over 14 minutes. The likelihood of getting less than seven hours of sleep also increases as temperatures rise.
The investigators found that under normal living routines, people appear far better at adapting to colder outside temperatures than hotter conditions.