14 DAY TRIAL // The conclusions of a new study carried out by researchers at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) indicate that children who watch TV or who sleep in a room with a TV sleep less than their peers who do not have constant access to this commodity. The average reduction, the team calculated, was around half an hour per night.
Studies such as this are very important because sleep deprivation contributes to the development of mental and physical health problems, as evidenced by numerous studies. The new research followed some 1,800 children, aged from 6 months to 8 years, and determined that the connection between TV viewing and a reduction in sleep duration was pervasive across all age groups.
This is the first large-scale investigation to assess the nature of this link over several years, the team reports in the latest issue of the esteemed scientific journal Pediatrics. The data the team worked with was provided by mothers enrolled in Project Viva when their children were six months old and then again annually for the next 7 years, PsychCentral reports.
Statistically, for every additional hour of television they watched, children lost an average of seven minutes of sleep per night. The correlation was strongest for racial and ethnic minority kids, the team reveals. The presence of a TV in the room where the young ones slept was found to be most detrimental to their sleep patterns, the study concluded.