13 ms·

Morning diurnal preference is associated with reduced risk of depression: study

241 points by intellaughs 5y ago

isaiahg 5y ago
Isn't it more likely that people who aren't depressed wake up earlier
- QasimK 5y ago
  I’m not sure I fully understood from the article, but it seems like they were using genetics as a proxy for “natural” wake-up time and something something causation for depression. I didn’t really get it despite reading the explanation three times. I’m not convinced but that could just be down to this article rather than the paper itself. I just don’t get how they accounted for something like “depression causes people to sleep later and for longer”.
austinwade 5y ago
This is interesting as I’ve noticed that when I sleep only 6-7 hours and leave my bed in the morning feeling tired because I could have slept more, I typically feel happier throughout the day than days when I sleep 8-9 hours and wake up naturally without an alarm. I’ve suffered with depression on and off myself and I really think there is something to the article’s claims.
- QasimK 5y ago
  I don’t think the article is talking about sleeping for one hour less. It has examples saying “go to sleep one hour earlier; wake up one hour earlier” - so the same amount of sleep.
  - varispeed 5y ago
    How this reconcile with the school that says people have a natural sleep pattern? For example I cannot fall asleep earlier than 2am. I was actually depressed because of everyone telling me I have to go to bed at 11pm or even earlier and that made me feel sad that I just couldn't. Only through a therapy I learned that it is perfectly okay to go to sleep at 2am. I also found out that in my case I only need 6 hours of sleep max. I was very sad that I almost never had the mythical 8 hours of sleep.
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      The abstract just says people genetically inclined to wake up early are less likely to have major depressive disorder. The full text says their data are consistent recent randomized clinical trial that shifted the sleep timing of individuals with an evening diurnal preference.[1] But that study seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable.[2] It should be compared to accommodating people's natural sleep cycles. [1] https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas... [2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/
      - varispeed 5y ago
        So isn't that a common sense? If you are inclined to wake up later than the society expects of you, then you are likely to be depressed because of the pressure? > that shifted the sleep timing of individuals with an evening diurnal preference > But that study seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable. That's sounds like something akin to telling a depressed person "why can't you just be happy?" and then making them watch comedy?
- elwell 5y ago
  I remember reading something recently about (short term?) benefits of sleep deprivation for various mental illnesses. (Note, not medical advice!)
- esolyt 5y ago
  I just want to point out though, depression isn't about feeling happy or sad throughout the day. Depression is more of a long-term condition. It's likely you have something interesting to do or something to keep you occupied in days you're waking up early. You might feel happy those days, but lack of sleep might actually be worsening your depression in the long run. Not saying this is what's happening necessarily, but it's possible. That said, the article isn't even talking about sleeping less, it's talking about waking up early. But I remember seeing interesting studies that are actually studying the link between sleep deprivation and depression.
- balfirevic 5y ago
  It's not really the same scenario you've described, but you might be interested in knowing that sleep deprivation can treat depression: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/sleep-is-the-mate-of-death https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/sleep-is-the-mate-of-d...
  - huachimingo 5y ago
    Exactly this. One day I slept like 2 hours and all my anxiety and depressive symptoms went temporarily away. I would not recommend it btw, even if you have that little extra energy boost at the beginning.
- lanstin 5y ago
  Best thing for me is to wake up early and then take a nice 2 pm nap for whatever hours extra sleep you feel you need. Much more refreshing than just sleeping late.
  - balfirevic 5y ago
    Don't you find it painful to wake up that way? Waking up without enough sleep feels terrible, even without ostensible bad effects on health and performance.
jmacd 5y ago
Someone very close to me was dealing with pretty severe depression during their medical residency in a very intense program. They were having trouble finding the time to talk to someone about it let alone to go see a proper psychiatrist. Finally they spoke to one of their preceptors. The advice? Double up your shifts for a week and grind yourself down until you absolutely are sleep deprived (they are all generally sleep deprived in this program, but have stretches of 3 or 4 days off). It seemed almost sadist to me, but they did it. We were all surprised when it more or less worked. I would say it bought them a month here, a month there when needed. It seems like a terrible strategy over the long term but something was definitely going on. They called it a "big reset" and also insisted that they had an overall sense of euphoria for a week or so following each "dosing". They don't do it anymore, after trying a few different medications a particular SSRI really seemed to click and it's been 20 years now without a major recurrence.
- CoastalCoder 5y ago
  I feel bad for any patients seen by a resident who is intentionally sleep-deprived. It sounds like a legit factor in a malpractice lawsuit.
  - intellaughs 5y ago
    Although they do still work long hours, there is a now a law prohibiting residents from being worked over 80 hours per week. It's called the "Libby Zion Law." The law is in place because of a famous malpractice lawsuit due to a resident physician that administered pethidine when the patient was already on phenelzine, causing her to die. This caused a fatal drug interaction that the resident should have understood was deadly.
    - jmacd 5y ago
      It's applied by the individual programs, but residents often have multiple sets of obligations :(
- teachingassist 5y ago
  This feels to me like it's not good advice, with the same theme as "drink alcohol". People report feeling good despite taking a depressant, and self-medicate their depression with alcohol.
robocat 5y ago
The tl;dr from the paper’s abstract: “Morning diurnal preference is associated with reduced risk of major depressive disorder (MDD); however, causality in this association is uncertain.”. So the article appears to be bullshit. That said, if you suffer from depression, trying to alter your sleep pattern is a worthwhile experiment - there is a good chance it could work for you.
- bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  Yeah, from its URL the website already looks sketchy, "medi lifestyle news"? People need to learn to recognise content farms when they see them... Googling the first paragraph points me to other farms, with this Yahoo News article maybe being the original source, although it's also sourced from some random Indian media site called ANI: https://news.yahoo.com/waking-just-one-hour-earlier-032908068.html https://news.yahoo.com/waking-just-one-hour-earlier-03290806... Edit, a more legitimate URL: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210528114107.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210528114107.h...
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    It was a University of Colorado press release.[1] [1] https://www.colorado.edu/today/2021/05/27/want-reduce-your-depression-risk-wake-hour-earlier https://www.colorado.edu/today/2021/05/27/want-reduce-your-d...
steve_adams_86 5y ago
I have a very acute sense of gloom and almost anxiety when I wake up late. Or even get out of bed late. For me personally this definitely accumulates into a sort of sense that I’m unhappy, not living well, and need a change. It correlated with more depressed times without questions. But is it the cause or a symptom? My wife doesn’t really get it, and it bothers her quite a bit frankly. But I’ve come to crave waking up early, and doing so is almost like the first accomplishment of the day. Before cleaning my sleeping area, coffee, anything - I made the effort to respect my time and my day, setting myself up for success. I know I’ll sleep better that night, and give myself proper time to accommodate what I need to do that day. It feels right. I do wonder sometimes though, where is the head and tail of it? Is it a purely psychological phenomenon or do I actually benefit from waking earlier, regardless of time spent asleep? Is it a learned thing, or am I actually sensitive to my needs? Sleep is a hard one to understand. All I know is I need a lot of it.
- smabie 5y ago
  I hate waking up early, but feel exactly the same way: because waking up early is hard for me, if I do it, I feel like I've already accomplished something. Conversely, if I wake up late, I feel like a failure. This is kind of unfortunate, because I can wake up anytime I want and start work, I don't have to start working at any particular time. I also physically feel pretty shitty when I wake up early. But I can't just shake the feeling of being a failure when I wake up late. I've always thought it to be purely psychological, but maybe that's not the case.
  - steve_adams_86 5y ago
    Sometimes waking and pushing myself into the day feels bad, but I rarely feel bad within 15 minutes of the initial dread of getting up. Is that the same for you, or do you mean it stays with you all day?
    - smabie 5y ago
      Maybe like an hour or two. I think I have some circadian rhythm disorder as my sleep schedule drifts later and later until I'm going to bed at 7am or so.
fridif 5y ago
Funny, I only feel depressed when I wake up early.
- missedthecue 5y ago
  Do you feel depressed when you wake up early having gotten adequate sleep?
  - fridif 5y ago
    Yes absolutely, even if ive slept 9PM to 630AM, something about the early morning makes my neck and stomach burn and my eyes hurt. Strange!
- fsckboy 5y ago
  "feeling depressed on a day" and "major depression" are not at all the same thing
- jimmy2020 5y ago
  yeah, same here!
- brigandish 5y ago
  Despondent might be a better term if it's not clinical depression.
macNchz 5y ago
>“We live in a society that is designed for morning people, and evening people often feel as if they are in a constant state of misalignment with that societal clock,” said Daghlas. This certainly resonates with me...I've long been quite a night owl, very much so in my teens (with long periods where I was sleeping from 5am to 1pm if left to my own devices) and much less so now in my 30s, but each transition–to college or more flexible jobs–that gave me more control over my schedule and when my days would start also coincided with feeling a lot better about myself. It is not an exaggeration in the slightest to say that many people will treat you badly, joke about you and mock you to your face if you have trouble getting out of bed before 9 or 10am. I thankfully never struggled with depression around it and have had very flexible work schedules, but I can totally appreciate how the circumstances of being someone whose sleep schedule doesn't line up with society's expectations can really wear on a person.
- freshhawk 5y ago
  Yeah, this just obviously correct. Sure, maybe there is some other biological factor that accounts for some of the increased rates of depression. But it's an amazingly safe bet that the main factor is the part where we treat people poorly and openly classify them as a bad person. This seems pretty simple. Until the had too much of an effect on my health I medicated myself into a morning person sleep schedule. I felt worse physically, just low key bad all the time, but I miss it so much. Getting treated that much better, with absolute benefit of the doubt given to me regarding everything I did, instead of the complete opposite, was really great.
  - bjornjajayaja 5y ago
    I think everyone is somewhat affected the same way because of devices. The natural rhythm of humans is sunrise to sunset, without electricity. But we put ourselves in the pixel glow around the clock! A more beneficial study than the OP would be to turn off all lights by sun down, and remove all technology. I’d wager folks would naturally wake up with sunrise over time and feel healthier, assuming they know what to do with themselves.
Tangokat 5y ago
The title is bullshit. They found that people who wake up earlier are less likely to be depressed. NOT that you can just wake up earlier and cure your depression. "Genetically proxied earlier diurnal preference was associated with a 23% lower risk of depression"
- coding123 5y ago
  Yup I think they ran straight into a causal reversal.
  - cortesoft 5y ago
    Or it could just be a correlation. Same thing causes both.
    - tgb 5y ago
      So the article tries to separate this out by using Mendelian randomization which supposedly fixes this since whether or not you inherit a genetic variant from your parent is a coin toss. However it has to make some other assumptions that are pretty hard to justify when it comes to something as complex as sleep schedules. There are some strategies to at least detect when things go wrong, though.
      - dcolkitt 5y ago
        Except the problem with Mendelian randomization is that genes that control circadian rhythm are also likely to affect mood.
        tgb 5y ago
        Well, indeed, that is what their main finding is. The question is do they affect mood by means other than affecting circadian rhythm?
  - unishark 5y ago
    There have been studies suggesting causality in both directions. The resulting vicious cycles you get from that are common in mental illness.
IvyMike 5y ago
"Waking up late is a sign of depression" would match the article contents better. And I mean, then it's a "study reaffirms what we already know" headline.
gwern 5y ago
Fulltext: https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas...
- joshka 5y ago
  So reading the actual paper suggests that the article's summary and title is poor / clickbait. This paper does not go into much testing of changing the wake time. Instead it looks at correlations of life-long earlier wake times and suggests that studying the article's claimed effect (earlier sleep times) could be worthwhile. Several TL;DR quotes: >Our data are consistent with results from a recent randomized clinical trial7that shifted the sleep timing of individuals withan evening diurnal preference. The multifaceted intervention targeted sleep timing, meal timing, light exposure, caffeine in-take, napping behavior, and exercise behavior. This intervention resulted in a mean 2-hour advance in sleep-wake timing and advanced the dim light melatonin onset, a circadian rhythm timing marker. There was no effect on sleep duration or the time between sleep onset and dim light melatonin onset timing,which suggests the absence of sleep deprivation or worsening of circadian misalignment as a consequence of this intervention.7Participants allocated to the intervention arm had improvements in the overall Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale score, as well as the depression and stress subscale scores. >While this trial also lends support to a causal protective effect of morningness on mood,the study was small (n = 22) and did not assess hard clinical endpoints. In contrast, our analysis tested the association with life-long modification of diurnal preference and assessed the clini-cal end point of MDD diagnosis. Taken together, our results suggest that interventions such as those implemented in this trial7may be worth scaling to larger clinical trials >This 2-sample MR analysis found robust genetic evidence for a protective association between earlier diurnal preference with lower MDD risk, and contextualized this association using an objective sleep timing measure. The findings support further investigation in the form of randomized clinical trials of sleep timing interventions for the prevention of MDD.
  - exolymph 5y ago
    > So reading the actual paper suggests that the article's summary and title is poor / clickbait. Ugh, every time, feels like. Science "reporting" tends to be pretty worthless.
smlss_sftwr 5y ago
I recall there was another study that observed sleep deprivation being associated with alleviation of depression symptoms, so I wonder if the same psychobiological mechanism is at play here (if waking up early could be scientifically considered as a mild form of sleep deprivation). I also notice most of my peers working remotely and myself included tend to wake up later in the day and I wonder how much if any of the widespread miasma during lockdowns/mandated WFH period could be attributed to this phenomenon -- there are plenty of confounding factors but I think it would be worth investigating further.
didibus 5y ago
> This means that if someone who regularly goes to bed at 1 a.m. instead goes to bed at midnight and sleeps for the same amount of time, they can reduce their risk by 23% That's not what it means at all. It means that people with the genetics which causes them to naturally sleep earlier might also be genetically less at risk of depression. You'd need to make an experiment where you take depressed people with genetics that causes them to naturally be night owls and force them to sleep earlier somehow (find a way where they can actually start to fall asleep sooner and all), and then measure the impact on depression to prove that it means what they claim it means, otherwise it is just correlation, not causation.
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  The paper cited a study. But it was small and seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable.[1] It should be compared to accommodating people's natural sleep cycles. [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    And other studies found large sleep phase changes are very hard to maintain. A single late night or an illness can send someone back to their natural schedule.
- wpietri 5y ago
  For what it's worth, I shifted my sleep schedule via changes in sleep hygiene and lighting. My mood is way more even. If I mess up my sleep schedule, my mood tends darker. So as a former "natural" night owl, I think causation is plausible.
qwerty456127 5y ago
One hour earlier than what? Do they mean I should use an alarm clock to force myself get up earlier than I wake up naturally?
agd621 5y ago
If I were to guess, the correlation to happiness (if any) has more to do with how the extra hour in the morning is used. It’s likely that people find themselves with an extra hour in the morning and do something more fulfilling than when it was at night. Whether it’s more personal time, a nicer breakfast, or even just taking more time to get ready with less anxiety of being late - all can be fulfilling in their own right. Whereas that same hour before bed all to often becomes mindless screen time.
stanrivers 5y ago
But that's also impossible, so not sure what the point is...
jcun4128 5y ago
Too tired to notice you're sad This is how I function though, make my job interesting (EHR) I am sleep deprived and living on energy drinks. [d]
jimmy2020 5y ago
> According to recent studies, obtaining more daylight during the day, as early risers do, triggers a chain reaction of hormonal changes that might affect mood. I think this is the key is the daylight, not the regular amount of light, but the strong brightness in the early morning that trigger hormone affects not only our mood but our immune system as well. Personally, I don't think it's related to a sleep schedule. it's more about the light. I've been recently listening to the Andrew Huberman podcast. He's a neuroscientist and has a weekly episode. And in one of his episodes, he mentioned that regular human being needs to be exposed to sunlight at least 30 mins a day. Not just a light, but the strong brightness coming from the sun which triggers hormones increase our alertness by raising the amount of cortisol in the body. of course, this means more productivity, more immunity, and controls the mood. There's another way to do it, an ice bath for example but the light is actually more important than we think.
SMAAART 5y ago
Causation vs Correlation? People with no mental illness get a good night's sleep, are more productive and therefore get up early in the morning. People with Depression and/or Anxiety have trouble falling asleep and sleeping, so once they fall asleep late at night, they will wake up later in the morning after 4-5 hours of sleep.
- M2Ys4U 5y ago
  People who are morning larks also face less social stigma than night owls
dhosek 5y ago
I'm reading this at 11p. I really should go to sleep instead.
teolandon 5y ago
I wake up 24 hours earlier, in order to lower my chance of major depression 24 times. A real life-hack.
PostThisTooFast 5y ago
One hour earlier than WHAT? Yeah. That's the problem.
tiku 5y ago
Or longer sleepers are already more depressed and don't want to get up?
lamontcg 5y ago
> This means that if someone who regularly goes to bed at 1 a.m. instead goes to bed at midnight and sleeps for the same amount of time, they can reduce their risk by 23%; if they go to bed at 11 p.m., they can reduce their risk by roughly 40%. According to the research, people who are already early risers may benefit from waking up even earlier. For those in the moderate or evening ranges, however, shifting to an earlier bedtime would likely be helpful. Except, correlation does not imply causality. And some people are night owls by choice and can easily change their behavior to conform, and some people have fairly severe sleep disorders and really can't. This is a bit like showing gay and trans people are often depressed, so if you just got them to stop they'd be happier. Complete with a bunch of people in this comment thread who were bi in college and later settled down heteronormatively so clearly everyone else can, too (all the people who were nightowls when they were younger but easily moved their schedule).
cupcake-unicorn 5y ago
Disappointed by the comments here. HN...pure clickbait...correlation != causation much? There was no study about waking up earlier, only showing a correlation between people who do wake up earlier and having less depression. I very much doubt forcing the depressed people to wake up an hour earlier and stop being night owls would help as all that stuff is probably genetic and also correlated to the genes contributing to depression. This is as bad as "drink chamomile tea" and will be insensitively passed around from relatives to people with serious chronic behavioral health issues. However honestly the chamomile tea has more weight behind it than this.
2Gkashmiri 5y ago
is this research funded by the international federation of early rising moms 'cos it feels like just that
hathym 5y ago
I wakeup 4 hours earlier. It did not help :D
willis936 5y ago
I see the lack of understanding statistics and causality still permeate the field of social science. How can we use this conclusion to oppress minorities? Eugenics isn't in favor at the moment.
brigandish 5y ago
Does anyone here have advice for how to get others to respect or just appreciate the different need for a change in sleep schedule? Like some others here, I've tried waking up early and I feel much better for it, but then my schedule becomes a inconvenience for others around me and that leads to it slipping or indirect sabotage of it.
thanatos519 5y ago
I wake up at 06:30 to make my kid breakfast and get him to school on time. Maybe I would be less depressed if I got up another hour earlier.
jacobmischka 5y ago
I used to be an extreme night owl when younger, I would commonly stay up until 8am playing video games and sleep until dusk. A few years ago I got into a fitness kick, and in addition to exercising to borderline excess and losing a lot of weight, I changed to an almost equally extreme morning person: waking up at 2-3am to exercise before starting my day and going to sleep at 6-7pm. I can't say I would recommend either extreme, it's pretty ridiculous going to bed when it's broad daylight half of the year and waking up at such an ungodly hour. But I love mornings now, and it's so nice essentially being done with basically everything you have to do by noon, an extreme version of eating your frogs early. I feel like I've lived a whole day by the time people roll out of bed, though of course that also means I'm sleeping like a small child when people are enjoying their evenings. Definitely not conducive to a healthy family life, but as a bachelor I'm enjoying it for now.
trophycase 5y ago
This just confirms what I've been trying to tell my friends for years, which is that "when you sleep matters just as much as how long" but they always seem to roll their eyes. Though it seems pretty obvious that one feels more well rested going to bed at 10 and waking at 7 as opposed to going to bed at 5am and waking at 2pm
throw14082020 5y ago
I don't think its necessarily the time of sleep that matters, but the consistent time of sleeping and waking up, including a long enough gap between (sleep hours). For me, that was what really helped. Waking up early does boost confidence/ ego a bit though.
ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
I get up at 5AM, most days. On weekends, I let myself “sleep in,” to 5:30 or 6. Sometimes, I take short naps, during the day (“short” meaning that I lie in a recliner for an hour or so, and “nod off” for a couple of 15-20 minute snoozes). That seems to work for me. Couldn’t do that, going into an office, so WFH FTW. I often get more accomplished by 8AM, than I used to get done in half a day, at the office. I find that my bug-hunting is best done early.
hyko 5y ago
No it can’t.
op00to 5y ago
My youngest wakes me up at 5am every morning. Why am I not zippity do dah happy then? Ha ha.
mszmszmsz 5y ago
Corellation vs causation? Please tell me if this article doesn’t confuse these two.
dosman33 5y ago
In unrelated news, people experiencing depression tend to sleep in an extra hour, film at 11.
rdtwo 5y ago
I think it’s just that most night owls have poor sleep hygiene. It’s Easy to stay up to midnight or 2 or sometimes 4 and sleep till whenever but that kind of shift is not good for you sleep quality
chadlavi 5y ago
Depressed? Just change your genes. /s This is a misleading headline to say the least. On par with "just stop being sad."
Juntu 5y ago
Minor in majority would agree and 70 percent will disagree for 1 percent that is i will completely bust the situation the more sleep I get the more my brain is resting so when I past away I die smart and my soul can be free knowing that my body had its tribulance so waking up period is a must when the mind sees in the dark it calls for organs to unrespond. Unfortunately theirs a line on someone’s bound to find out what true power of hacking means maximum level coding. The end
Aesverlryn 5y ago
Descriptions because studying for me is a natural thing, every day we are given assignments if one day is not finished it will be an additional task the next day, it really irritates me sometimes every night while looking at the sky I want to scream as loud as I can so make my heart calm as soon as I fall asleep and tomorrow back to learn everything is just like it feels like I want to die but maybe I will change into valuable
dalmo3 5y ago
Can confirm. I shifted my sleep in order to wake up 23 hours earlier and now I feel 82% less depressed.

241 points by intellaughs 5y ago

isaiahg 5y ago

Isn't it more likely that people who aren't depressed wake up earlier

QasimK 5y ago
I’m not sure I fully understood from the article, but it seems like they were using genetics as a proxy for “natural” wake-up time and something something causation for depression. I didn’t really get it despite reading the explanation three times. I’m not convinced but that could just be down to this article rather than the paper itself. I just don’t get how they accounted for something like “depression causes people to sleep later and for longer”.

austinwade 5y ago

This is interesting as I’ve noticed that when I sleep only 6-7 hours and leave my bed in the morning feeling tired because I could have slept more, I typically feel happier throughout the day than days when I sleep 8-9 hours and wake up naturally without an alarm. I’ve suffered with depression on and off myself and I really think there is something to the article’s claims.

QasimK 5y ago
I don’t think the article is talking about sleeping for one hour less. It has examples saying “go to sleep one hour earlier; wake up one hour earlier” - so the same amount of sleep.
- varispeed 5y ago
  How this reconcile with the school that says people have a natural sleep pattern? For example I cannot fall asleep earlier than 2am. I was actually depressed because of everyone telling me I have to go to bed at 11pm or even earlier and that made me feel sad that I just couldn't. Only through a therapy I learned that it is perfectly okay to go to sleep at 2am. I also found out that in my case I only need 6 hours of sleep max. I was very sad that I almost never had the mythical 8 hours of sleep.
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    The abstract just says people genetically inclined to wake up early are less likely to have major depressive disorder. The full text says their data are consistent recent randomized clinical trial that shifted the sleep timing of individuals with an evening diurnal preference.[1] But that study seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable.[2] It should be compared to accommodating people's natural sleep cycles. [1] https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas... [2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/
    - varispeed 5y ago
      So isn't that a common sense? If you are inclined to wake up later than the society expects of you, then you are likely to be depressed because of the pressure? > that shifted the sleep timing of individuals with an evening diurnal preference > But that study seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable. That's sounds like something akin to telling a depressed person "why can't you just be happy?" and then making them watch comedy?
elwell 5y ago
I remember reading something recently about (short term?) benefits of sleep deprivation for various mental illnesses. (Note, not medical advice!)
esolyt 5y ago
I just want to point out though, depression isn't about feeling happy or sad throughout the day. Depression is more of a long-term condition. It's likely you have something interesting to do or something to keep you occupied in days you're waking up early. You might feel happy those days, but lack of sleep might actually be worsening your depression in the long run. Not saying this is what's happening necessarily, but it's possible. That said, the article isn't even talking about sleeping less, it's talking about waking up early. But I remember seeing interesting studies that are actually studying the link between sleep deprivation and depression.
balfirevic 5y ago
It's not really the same scenario you've described, but you might be interested in knowing that sleep deprivation can treat depression: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/sleep-is-the-mate-of-death https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/sleep-is-the-mate-of-d...
- huachimingo 5y ago
  Exactly this. One day I slept like 2 hours and all my anxiety and depressive symptoms went temporarily away. I would not recommend it btw, even if you have that little extra energy boost at the beginning.
lanstin 5y ago
Best thing for me is to wake up early and then take a nice 2 pm nap for whatever hours extra sleep you feel you need. Much more refreshing than just sleeping late.
- balfirevic 5y ago
  Don't you find it painful to wake up that way? Waking up without enough sleep feels terrible, even without ostensible bad effects on health and performance.

jmacd 5y ago

Someone very close to me was dealing with pretty severe depression during their medical residency in a very intense program. They were having trouble finding the time to talk to someone about it let alone to go see a proper psychiatrist. Finally they spoke to one of their preceptors. The advice? Double up your shifts for a week and grind yourself down until you absolutely are sleep deprived (they are all generally sleep deprived in this program, but have stretches of 3 or 4 days off). It seemed almost sadist to me, but they did it. We were all surprised when it more or less worked. I would say it bought them a month here, a month there when needed. It seems like a terrible strategy over the long term but something was definitely going on. They called it a "big reset" and also insisted that they had an overall sense of euphoria for a week or so following each "dosing". They don't do it anymore, after trying a few different medications a particular SSRI really seemed to click and it's been 20 years now without a major recurrence.

CoastalCoder 5y ago
I feel bad for any patients seen by a resident who is intentionally sleep-deprived. It sounds like a legit factor in a malpractice lawsuit.
- intellaughs 5y ago
  Although they do still work long hours, there is a now a law prohibiting residents from being worked over 80 hours per week. It's called the "Libby Zion Law." The law is in place because of a famous malpractice lawsuit due to a resident physician that administered pethidine when the patient was already on phenelzine, causing her to die. This caused a fatal drug interaction that the resident should have understood was deadly.
  - jmacd 5y ago
    It's applied by the individual programs, but residents often have multiple sets of obligations :(
teachingassist 5y ago
This feels to me like it's not good advice, with the same theme as "drink alcohol". People report feeling good despite taking a depressant, and self-medicate their depression with alcohol.

robocat 5y ago

The tl;dr from the paper’s abstract: “Morning diurnal preference is associated with reduced risk of major depressive disorder (MDD); however, causality in this association is uncertain.”. So the article appears to be bullshit. That said, if you suffer from depression, trying to alter your sleep pattern is a worthwhile experiment - there is a good chance it could work for you.

bellyfullofbac 5y ago
Yeah, from its URL the website already looks sketchy, "medi lifestyle news"? People need to learn to recognise content farms when they see them... Googling the first paragraph points me to other farms, with this Yahoo News article maybe being the original source, although it's also sourced from some random Indian media site called ANI: https://news.yahoo.com/waking-just-one-hour-earlier-032908068.html https://news.yahoo.com/waking-just-one-hour-earlier-03290806... Edit, a more legitimate URL: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210528114107.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210528114107.h...
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  It was a University of Colorado press release.[1] [1] https://www.colorado.edu/today/2021/05/27/want-reduce-your-depression-risk-wake-hour-earlier https://www.colorado.edu/today/2021/05/27/want-reduce-your-d...

steve_adams_86 5y ago

I have a very acute sense of gloom and almost anxiety when I wake up late. Or even get out of bed late. For me personally this definitely accumulates into a sort of sense that I’m unhappy, not living well, and need a change. It correlated with more depressed times without questions. But is it the cause or a symptom? My wife doesn’t really get it, and it bothers her quite a bit frankly. But I’ve come to crave waking up early, and doing so is almost like the first accomplishment of the day. Before cleaning my sleeping area, coffee, anything - I made the effort to respect my time and my day, setting myself up for success. I know I’ll sleep better that night, and give myself proper time to accommodate what I need to do that day. It feels right. I do wonder sometimes though, where is the head and tail of it? Is it a purely psychological phenomenon or do I actually benefit from waking earlier, regardless of time spent asleep? Is it a learned thing, or am I actually sensitive to my needs? Sleep is a hard one to understand. All I know is I need a lot of it.

smabie 5y ago
I hate waking up early, but feel exactly the same way: because waking up early is hard for me, if I do it, I feel like I've already accomplished something. Conversely, if I wake up late, I feel like a failure. This is kind of unfortunate, because I can wake up anytime I want and start work, I don't have to start working at any particular time. I also physically feel pretty shitty when I wake up early. But I can't just shake the feeling of being a failure when I wake up late. I've always thought it to be purely psychological, but maybe that's not the case.
- steve_adams_86 5y ago
  Sometimes waking and pushing myself into the day feels bad, but I rarely feel bad within 15 minutes of the initial dread of getting up. Is that the same for you, or do you mean it stays with you all day?
  - smabie 5y ago
    Maybe like an hour or two. I think I have some circadian rhythm disorder as my sleep schedule drifts later and later until I'm going to bed at 7am or so.

fridif 5y ago

Funny, I only feel depressed when I wake up early.

missedthecue 5y ago
Do you feel depressed when you wake up early having gotten adequate sleep?
- fridif 5y ago
  Yes absolutely, even if ive slept 9PM to 630AM, something about the early morning makes my neck and stomach burn and my eyes hurt. Strange!
fsckboy 5y ago
"feeling depressed on a day" and "major depression" are not at all the same thing
jimmy2020 5y ago
yeah, same here!
brigandish 5y ago
Despondent might be a better term if it's not clinical depression.

macNchz 5y ago

>“We live in a society that is designed for morning people, and evening people often feel as if they are in a constant state of misalignment with that societal clock,” said Daghlas. This certainly resonates with me...I've long been quite a night owl, very much so in my teens (with long periods where I was sleeping from 5am to 1pm if left to my own devices) and much less so now in my 30s, but each transition–to college or more flexible jobs–that gave me more control over my schedule and when my days would start also coincided with feeling a lot better about myself. It is not an exaggeration in the slightest to say that many people will treat you badly, joke about you and mock you to your face if you have trouble getting out of bed before 9 or 10am. I thankfully never struggled with depression around it and have had very flexible work schedules, but I can totally appreciate how the circumstances of being someone whose sleep schedule doesn't line up with society's expectations can really wear on a person.

freshhawk 5y ago
Yeah, this just obviously correct. Sure, maybe there is some other biological factor that accounts for some of the increased rates of depression. But it's an amazingly safe bet that the main factor is the part where we treat people poorly and openly classify them as a bad person. This seems pretty simple. Until the had too much of an effect on my health I medicated myself into a morning person sleep schedule. I felt worse physically, just low key bad all the time, but I miss it so much. Getting treated that much better, with absolute benefit of the doubt given to me regarding everything I did, instead of the complete opposite, was really great.
- bjornjajayaja 5y ago
  I think everyone is somewhat affected the same way because of devices. The natural rhythm of humans is sunrise to sunset, without electricity. But we put ourselves in the pixel glow around the clock! A more beneficial study than the OP would be to turn off all lights by sun down, and remove all technology. I’d wager folks would naturally wake up with sunrise over time and feel healthier, assuming they know what to do with themselves.

Tangokat 5y ago

The title is bullshit. They found that people who wake up earlier are less likely to be depressed. NOT that you can just wake up earlier and cure your depression. "Genetically proxied earlier diurnal preference was associated with a 23% lower risk of depression"

coding123 5y ago
Yup I think they ran straight into a causal reversal.
- cortesoft 5y ago
  Or it could just be a correlation. Same thing causes both.
  - tgb 5y ago
    So the article tries to separate this out by using Mendelian randomization which supposedly fixes this since whether or not you inherit a genetic variant from your parent is a coin toss. However it has to make some other assumptions that are pretty hard to justify when it comes to something as complex as sleep schedules. There are some strategies to at least detect when things go wrong, though.
    - dcolkitt 5y ago
      Except the problem with Mendelian randomization is that genes that control circadian rhythm are also likely to affect mood.
      - tgb 5y ago
        Well, indeed, that is what their main finding is. The question is do they affect mood by means other than affecting circadian rhythm?
- unishark 5y ago
  There have been studies suggesting causality in both directions. The resulting vicious cycles you get from that are common in mental illness.

IvyMike 5y ago

"Waking up late is a sign of depression" would match the article contents better. And I mean, then it's a "study reaffirms what we already know" headline.

gwern 5y ago

Fulltext: https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/correlation/2021-daghlas...

joshka 5y ago
So reading the actual paper suggests that the article's summary and title is poor / clickbait. This paper does not go into much testing of changing the wake time. Instead it looks at correlations of life-long earlier wake times and suggests that studying the article's claimed effect (earlier sleep times) could be worthwhile. Several TL;DR quotes: >Our data are consistent with results from a recent randomized clinical trial7that shifted the sleep timing of individuals withan evening diurnal preference. The multifaceted intervention targeted sleep timing, meal timing, light exposure, caffeine in-take, napping behavior, and exercise behavior. This intervention resulted in a mean 2-hour advance in sleep-wake timing and advanced the dim light melatonin onset, a circadian rhythm timing marker. There was no effect on sleep duration or the time between sleep onset and dim light melatonin onset timing,which suggests the absence of sleep deprivation or worsening of circadian misalignment as a consequence of this intervention.7Participants allocated to the intervention arm had improvements in the overall Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale score, as well as the depression and stress subscale scores. >While this trial also lends support to a causal protective effect of morningness on mood,the study was small (n = 22) and did not assess hard clinical endpoints. In contrast, our analysis tested the association with life-long modification of diurnal preference and assessed the clini-cal end point of MDD diagnosis. Taken together, our results suggest that interventions such as those implemented in this trial7may be worth scaling to larger clinical trials >This 2-sample MR analysis found robust genetic evidence for a protective association between earlier diurnal preference with lower MDD risk, and contextualized this association using an objective sleep timing measure. The findings support further investigation in the form of randomized clinical trials of sleep timing interventions for the prevention of MDD.
- exolymph 5y ago
  > So reading the actual paper suggests that the article's summary and title is poor / clickbait. Ugh, every time, feels like. Science "reporting" tends to be pretty worthless.

smlss_sftwr 5y ago

I recall there was another study that observed sleep deprivation being associated with alleviation of depression symptoms, so I wonder if the same psychobiological mechanism is at play here (if waking up early could be scientifically considered as a mild form of sleep deprivation). I also notice most of my peers working remotely and myself included tend to wake up later in the day and I wonder how much if any of the widespread miasma during lockdowns/mandated WFH period could be attributed to this phenomenon -- there are plenty of confounding factors but I think it would be worth investigating further.

didibus 5y ago

> This means that if someone who regularly goes to bed at 1 a.m. instead goes to bed at midnight and sleeps for the same amount of time, they can reduce their risk by 23% That's not what it means at all. It means that people with the genetics which causes them to naturally sleep earlier might also be genetically less at risk of depression. You'd need to make an experiment where you take depressed people with genetics that causes them to naturally be night owls and force them to sleep earlier somehow (find a way where they can actually start to fall asleep sooner and all), and then measure the impact on depression to prove that it means what they claim it means, otherwise it is just correlation, not causation.

pseudalopex 5y ago
The paper cited a study. But it was small and seems to be about making an unnatural schedule more bearable.[1] It should be compared to accommodating people's natural sleep cycles. [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31202686/
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  And other studies found large sleep phase changes are very hard to maintain. A single late night or an illness can send someone back to their natural schedule.
wpietri 5y ago
For what it's worth, I shifted my sleep schedule via changes in sleep hygiene and lighting. My mood is way more even. If I mess up my sleep schedule, my mood tends darker. So as a former "natural" night owl, I think causation is plausible.

qwerty456127 5y ago

One hour earlier than what? Do they mean I should use an alarm clock to force myself get up earlier than I wake up naturally?

agd621 5y ago

If I were to guess, the correlation to happiness (if any) has more to do with how the extra hour in the morning is used. It’s likely that people find themselves with an extra hour in the morning and do something more fulfilling than when it was at night. Whether it’s more personal time, a nicer breakfast, or even just taking more time to get ready with less anxiety of being late - all can be fulfilling in their own right. Whereas that same hour before bed all to often becomes mindless screen time.

stanrivers 5y ago

But that's also impossible, so not sure what the point is...

jcun4128 5y ago

Too tired to notice you're sad This is how I function though, make my job interesting (EHR) I am sleep deprived and living on energy drinks. [d]

jimmy2020 5y ago

> According to recent studies, obtaining more daylight during the day, as early risers do, triggers a chain reaction of hormonal changes that might affect mood. I think this is the key is the daylight, not the regular amount of light, but the strong brightness in the early morning that trigger hormone affects not only our mood but our immune system as well. Personally, I don't think it's related to a sleep schedule. it's more about the light. I've been recently listening to the Andrew Huberman podcast. He's a neuroscientist and has a weekly episode. And in one of his episodes, he mentioned that regular human being needs to be exposed to sunlight at least 30 mins a day. Not just a light, but the strong brightness coming from the sun which triggers hormones increase our alertness by raising the amount of cortisol in the body. of course, this means more productivity, more immunity, and controls the mood. There's another way to do it, an ice bath for example but the light is actually more important than we think.

SMAAART 5y ago

Causation vs Correlation? People with no mental illness get a good night's sleep, are more productive and therefore get up early in the morning. People with Depression and/or Anxiety have trouble falling asleep and sleeping, so once they fall asleep late at night, they will wake up later in the morning after 4-5 hours of sleep.

M2Ys4U 5y ago
People who are morning larks also face less social stigma than night owls

dhosek 5y ago

I'm reading this at 11p. I really should go to sleep instead.

teolandon 5y ago

I wake up 24 hours earlier, in order to lower my chance of major depression 24 times. A real life-hack.

PostThisTooFast 5y ago

One hour earlier than WHAT? Yeah. That's the problem.

tiku 5y ago

Or longer sleepers are already more depressed and don't want to get up?

lamontcg 5y ago

> This means that if someone who regularly goes to bed at 1 a.m. instead goes to bed at midnight and sleeps for the same amount of time, they can reduce their risk by 23%; if they go to bed at 11 p.m., they can reduce their risk by roughly 40%. According to the research, people who are already early risers may benefit from waking up even earlier. For those in the moderate or evening ranges, however, shifting to an earlier bedtime would likely be helpful. Except, correlation does not imply causality. And some people are night owls by choice and can easily change their behavior to conform, and some people have fairly severe sleep disorders and really can't. This is a bit like showing gay and trans people are often depressed, so if you just got them to stop they'd be happier. Complete with a bunch of people in this comment thread who were bi in college and later settled down heteronormatively so clearly everyone else can, too (all the people who were nightowls when they were younger but easily moved their schedule).

cupcake-unicorn 5y ago

Disappointed by the comments here. HN...pure clickbait...correlation != causation much? There was no study about waking up earlier, only showing a correlation between people who do wake up earlier and having less depression. I very much doubt forcing the depressed people to wake up an hour earlier and stop being night owls would help as all that stuff is probably genetic and also correlated to the genes contributing to depression. This is as bad as "drink chamomile tea" and will be insensitively passed around from relatives to people with serious chronic behavioral health issues. However honestly the chamomile tea has more weight behind it than this.

2Gkashmiri 5y ago

is this research funded by the international federation of early rising moms 'cos it feels like just that

hathym 5y ago

I wakeup 4 hours earlier. It did not help :D

willis936 5y ago

I see the lack of understanding statistics and causality still permeate the field of social science. How can we use this conclusion to oppress minorities? Eugenics isn't in favor at the moment.

brigandish 5y ago

Does anyone here have advice for how to get others to respect or just appreciate the different need for a change in sleep schedule? Like some others here, I've tried waking up early and I feel much better for it, but then my schedule becomes a inconvenience for others around me and that leads to it slipping or indirect sabotage of it.

thanatos519 5y ago

I wake up at 06:30 to make my kid breakfast and get him to school on time. Maybe I would be less depressed if I got up another hour earlier.

jacobmischka 5y ago

I used to be an extreme night owl when younger, I would commonly stay up until 8am playing video games and sleep until dusk. A few years ago I got into a fitness kick, and in addition to exercising to borderline excess and losing a lot of weight, I changed to an almost equally extreme morning person: waking up at 2-3am to exercise before starting my day and going to sleep at 6-7pm. I can't say I would recommend either extreme, it's pretty ridiculous going to bed when it's broad daylight half of the year and waking up at such an ungodly hour. But I love mornings now, and it's so nice essentially being done with basically everything you have to do by noon, an extreme version of eating your frogs early. I feel like I've lived a whole day by the time people roll out of bed, though of course that also means I'm sleeping like a small child when people are enjoying their evenings. Definitely not conducive to a healthy family life, but as a bachelor I'm enjoying it for now.

trophycase 5y ago

This just confirms what I've been trying to tell my friends for years, which is that "when you sleep matters just as much as how long" but they always seem to roll their eyes. Though it seems pretty obvious that one feels more well rested going to bed at 10 and waking at 7 as opposed to going to bed at 5am and waking at 2pm

throw14082020 5y ago

I don't think its necessarily the time of sleep that matters, but the consistent time of sleeping and waking up, including a long enough gap between (sleep hours). For me, that was what really helped. Waking up early does boost confidence/ ego a bit though.

ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago

I get up at 5AM, most days. On weekends, I let myself “sleep in,” to 5:30 or 6. Sometimes, I take short naps, during the day (“short” meaning that I lie in a recliner for an hour or so, and “nod off” for a couple of 15-20 minute snoozes). That seems to work for me. Couldn’t do that, going into an office, so WFH FTW. I often get more accomplished by 8AM, than I used to get done in half a day, at the office. I find that my bug-hunting is best done early.

hyko 5y ago

No it can’t.

op00to 5y ago

My youngest wakes me up at 5am every morning. Why am I not zippity do dah happy then? Ha ha.

mszmszmsz 5y ago

Corellation vs causation? Please tell me if this article doesn’t confuse these two.

dosman33 5y ago

In unrelated news, people experiencing depression tend to sleep in an extra hour, film at 11.

rdtwo 5y ago

I think it’s just that most night owls have poor sleep hygiene. It’s Easy to stay up to midnight or 2 or sometimes 4 and sleep till whenever but that kind of shift is not good for you sleep quality

chadlavi 5y ago

Depressed? Just change your genes. /s This is a misleading headline to say the least. On par with "just stop being sad."

Juntu 5y ago

Minor in majority would agree and 70 percent will disagree for 1 percent that is i will completely bust the situation the more sleep I get the more my brain is resting so when I past away I die smart and my soul can be free knowing that my body had its tribulance so waking up period is a must when the mind sees in the dark it calls for organs to unrespond. Unfortunately theirs a line on someone’s bound to find out what true power of hacking means maximum level coding. The end

Aesverlryn 5y ago

Descriptions because studying for me is a natural thing, every day we are given assignments if one day is not finished it will be an additional task the next day, it really irritates me sometimes every night while looking at the sky I want to scream as loud as I can so make my heart calm as soon as I fall asleep and tomorrow back to learn everything is just like it feels like I want to die but maybe I will change into valuable

dalmo3 5y ago

Can confirm. I shifted my sleep in order to wake up 23 hours earlier and now I feel 82% less depressed.