The sleep-circadian interface: A window into mental disorders
Disruptions in sleep quality, continuity, and timing can trigger or worsen psychiatric symptoms, and vice versa.
Disruptions in sleep quality, continuity, and timing can trigger or worsen psychiatric symptoms, and vice versa.
High-performing athletes consistently ask themselves one thing before practice:
What can I do to get better today?
And one thing after practice:
What did I get better at today?
This focus on the process leads to the largest boost in performance.
What they found: There’s a reason that research finds that Nobel prize winning scientists tend to have more hobbies than those who are good but not quite great scientists. In this study, they researchers looked at how leisure activity impacts our work. What they found is that leisure activity boosts work self-efficacy, potentially helping us perform better in our day jobs. But there was an important caveat. It wasn’t just about having a hobby, the impact of workplace self-efficacy was highest when people took their hobby serious and it was different enough from their actual work. In other words, if their hobby was too similar to their work, it actually hurt work self-efficacy.
What it means: Common advice tells us to get obsessed about something to be great at it. Be the football coach who only loves all things football. Well…research might point us in another direction. In this case, we need activities and hobbies that are different. Activities that allow us to turn our brains away from whatever it is we do during our day job. Diversify your experiences and pursuits.
Is there an optimum time to eat dinner to reduce the risk for Type 2 Diabetes? This study on 7000+ adults found eating dinner 3h or longer before bedtime is associated with reduced risk for type 2 Diabetes.
In addition to making you more alert during the day, improving your mood and sleep, the blue in bright morning sunlight acts as a countermeasure or antidote to some of the damaging health effects of artificial light at night.
It doesn’t give you a free pass to use artificial light at night without bad health effects, but it reinforces your circadian system so that exposure to a blast of artificial light at night doesn’t hurt you as much.
Brief morning light exposure preceding a day shift is effective in improving performance during the day, sleep at night and reducing fatigue for the preceding two weeks in nurses working shifts.
Multitasking is associated with higher blood pressure, more anxiety and can lower your mood by as much as 26%
Morning daylight will help to lift the mood, reduce stress and improve cognitive function
Physicians who take few vacation days each year are more likely to face burnout