"I wanted to explore media use by a diverse population and its association with sleep variables," sums up Ajar Diushekeeva, a doctoral student in Research and Intervention, Clinical Psychology option, at the Université de Montréal, under the supervision of Antonio Zadra (Department of Psychology) and Santiago Hidalgo (Department of Art History, Cinema and Audiovisual Media).
In her thesis, she conducted a cross-sectional and correlational study to examine media use in the hour before bedtime, using an online questionnaire. The student wanted to survey adults. "Over the past few decades, many studies have focused on children and adolescents, but few on adults and how smartphones are used during this time interval," she points out. And yet, this issue affects all generations.
Ajar Diushekeeva will present her initial findings at the 92nd Acfas Congress, which runs until May 9.
Widespread use
More than 700 people recruited from university courses and social networks answered an online questionnaire on their media viewing habits before going to sleep over the previous month. Questions covered activities and devices used (TV, phone, computer, print, digital or audio books, podcasts, music, etc.). Three sleep variables were also included: sleep quality, sleep duration and sleep latency.Preliminary results show that almost all (99%) of the sample had used a digital device at least a few times in the previous month before falling asleep. "It’s not surprising, but it’s still striking," notes the student. The majority reported having spent more time than desired (73%) in front of this device, and a large proportion had done so from bed.
While television remained popular (for 60% of respondents), the most widely used device was, unsurprisingly, the smartphone (91%). Nearly half of these users consulted it systematically before going to bed.
In terms of the activities themselves, social networks came out on top: 80% of those surveyed visited them sometimes, and a third always. Short videos were particularly popular. In second place was the viewing of films or series (79% sometimes, 20% always).
Ajar Diushekeeva also noted a gender difference: women were more likely to watch television, while men were more likely to play games on consoles or log on to their computers.
The doctoral student, who is also interested in the effects of media content on dreams, asked two exploratory questions on this theme, but does not know whether she will use these data (the second article of her doctorate on the subject will consist of a literature review).
The activity or the device?
But is it the device (and its blue light) or the activity that has the greatest impact on sleep? "Do the consequences on sleep come from the fact that these activities move the time at which we go to bed, or do these activities occupy the time that should be spent sleeping? That’s what I’d like to find out," confides Ajar Diushekeeva.Unfortunately, this type of study doesn’t provide a complete answer to the question. In fact, it’s hard to say whether media use has a negative influence on sleep variables, or whether it’s people who already have trouble falling asleep who use them to pass the time before bed or try to relax. "To do that, it would take experimental laboratory studies or longitudinal studies," she says.
But with such widespread use, there’s plenty to wonder about. "What we see in our study and in other recent ones is that adults are probably just as concerned as young people by the ubiquity of media in their pre-sleep routine. It would be interesting to see whether a particular habit or various uses of media would be more strongly associated with sleep quality", the doctoral student points out.
