The benefits of good sleep

[Meadbh]

from how you spell certain words, methinks you may be British. Apologies if I am wrong.

Irish-Canadian. Definitely not British. No need to apologize.

do you know if there have been any studies of sleep patterns changing as seasons change.

Yes! in people.....

Arch Gen Psychiatry -- Abstract: A Circadian Signal of Change of Season in Patients With Seasonal Affective Disorder, December 2001, Wehr et al. 58 (12): 1108

Seasonal variation in the human circadian rhythm: dissociation between sleep and temperature rhythm -- Honma et al. 262 (5): 885 -- AJP - Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology

Circadian and circannual rhythms of hormonal varia...[Chronobiol Int. 1984] - PubMed Result

and animals.....

SpringerLink - Journal Article

The rat suprachiasmatic nucleus is a clock for all seasons.

Circadian rhythms from flies to human : Abstract : Nature

 

[Alan]

Thanks for the links, very interesting.

The subjects went to bed earliest in summer, intermediate in spring and autumn, and latest in winter. A similar but more pronounced seasonality was observed in the wake-up time, which was earlier in summer than in winter.

May be this is the real reason I feel sleep deprived in the summer in England - the lighter nights make me want to stay up longer, particularly when the weather is nice - but I definitely wake up earlier.

When I lived there I used to work 8:30 to 5 and had an office with no windows. For about 3 months I used to drive to and from work in the dark and only saw daylight at lunch times when I would venture out for lunch. After the long dark winter months you want to get as much daylight as you can.