Gaming has often been given praise for its positive impacts on people in areas like cognitive functions – especially in children – and making people more alert. However, gaming has also been blamed for some of society's problems such as real-world violence and, now with evidence to back it, poor sleep.
TheSleepJudge recently ran a survey regarding how often people play video games before bed compared to how much sleep they get. In a survey of 982 people who play video games at least once a month, TheSleepJudge produced statistics and possible correlation between the frequency of gaming before bed and the respondents' quality of sleep, average hours of sleep per night, how long it takes to sleep, and more.
In the survey, 41.6% of men reported they play video games before bed either every day or often, while 33.8% said they only did so sometimes and 24.7% said rarely or never.
For women, 38.8% of female respondents said they played video games either every day or often before bed. However, 37.5% and 23.7% said they did so sometimes and rarely or never, respectively.
On average, respondents who reported that they had played games every day or often before bed get about 7.7 hours of sleep. Meanwhile, those falling into the "sometimes" camp get an average of 8.0 hours of sleep and those who responded "rarely or never" get 8.3 hours of sleep on average.
The survey includes other percentages and survey questions, such as ones regarding the quality of sleep. 33.6% of "every day or often" sleepers reported that they get, on average, a poor of quality of sleep, while 17.4% of "sometimes" sleepers get a poor quality of sleep and 19.1% of "rarely or never" sleepers get poor-quality sleep.
Consistently, respondents saying they played video games "every day or often" at nighttime indicated that they get the poorest quality sleep. For instance, when asked about how long it takes to fall asleep and their frequency of waking up at night, "every day or often" respondents indicated that they take longer to fall asleep and wake up more often on average.
There were also questions regarding genres of games before bed. Action games were the games that were most frequently played before bed at 34.2%, closely followed by mobile games at 26.8%. However, more gamers playing simulation titles before bed reported that they get poor quality of sleep, with 31.9% of simulation game nighttime players getting a poor quality of sleep.
The variety of statistics included in the survey is fairly fascinating. It shows that, while gaming is a great way for many to have fun and relax, it does have other impacts that should be considered. There are clearly many nighttime gamers out there, but for those looking for a good night's rest, it might be advisable to consider changing your gaming habits every once in a while.