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New Discovery Unravels Impact of Short Sleep on Depression
Unraveling the complicated relationship between short sleep and depression
Sleep and depression are strange bedfellows.
While sleep is a key aspect of our mental health and well-being, it also plays a critical role in developing depression. For instance, some studies link depression to sleep disturbances.
Researchers believe that people who sleep too much or too little at night are likely to have depression.
Until now, most of the studies only looked at how the number of hours of sleep can impact a person’s risk of depression. They mainly focused on the “how long” aspect of the impact of sleep.
The optimal amount of sleep varies from person to person and it’s believed that a normal adult needs around 6 to 7 hours of sleep every night to stay healthy.
Anything below this range is considered “short sleep.”
However, some people are naturally short sleepers. They get less than 5 hours of sleep every night and still function optimally due to the presence of a rare gene (found in only a tiny population of people) that allows them to have little sleep without suffering the typical side effects of sleep deprivation.
