By Rheana Murray, New York Daily News
New research shows how students’ heavy reliance on texting is linked to sleep problems, lower levels of well-being and burnout. Study author Karla Murdock said the problem mostly affects ‘heavy texters,’ people who text at least 100 times a day.
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Too much texting can lead to sleep problems, a new study suggests. |
Exhausted college students should consider their smartphone habits, according to a new study that links heavy texting with sleep problems.
Researchers from Washington and Lee University in Virginia discovered that among first-year students, those who sent the most text messages had the poorest sleep habits and lowest levels of emotional well-being.
“I think that we’re all pretty reliant on our cellphone at this point and students have grown up with it being a very important part of their social lives,” study author Karla Murdock, whose report was published in the journal Psychology of Popular Media Culture, told the Daily News.
She tried to determine what psychological effect that reliance has on students, by asking more than 80 undergrads how many texts they send and receive on an average day, how well they sleep, and how they feel about their social lives and performance at school.
Data from the American College Health Association shows that 40% of students feel rested only two days a week. Seventy percent of college students get less than eight hours of sleep a night.
Murdock determined that “heavy texters” — those who send more than 100 messages a day — are most likely to suffer from sleep problems and feel burnt out.
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