Study Shows Parents' Work Schedules may Impact Family Members' Sleep

In a recent US study of 1,815 disadvantaged mothers and their children, mothers who worked more than 35 hours per week were more likely to experience insufficient sleep compared with mothers who worked fewer hours, while children were more likely to experience insufficient sleep when their mothers worked between 20 and 40 hours. Nonstandard work schedules—such as working evenings, nights, or week-ends—were linked with an increased likelihood of insufficient sleep for mothers but not their children.

"The results highlight a potentially difficult balance between work and family for many disadvantaged working mothers in the United States," wrote the authors of the Journal of Marriage and Family study.

Sleep disorders are of different kinds and the reason behind each disorder varies. This may include difficulty falling or staying asleep, falling asleep at inappropriate times, excessive total sleep time or abnormal behaviors associated with sleep.

Women are twice more likely than men to suffer from sleep disorders.

Sleep is natural to all living beings. It signals the cessation of physical activity and heralds the hours of rest. Akin to other needs of the body such as food, water, and warmth, sleep is a blissful state of inactivity and unawareness that provides the required rest and rejuvenates an individual for the activities of the ensuing day with increased vigor.

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Source-Eurekalert